Financial Incentives Can Encourage Weight Loss

Sept. 11, 2007— -- Money motivates people to slim down. Overweight employees who were paid a small amount lost more weight than those who weren't compensated for their efforts, according to one of the first studies to examine such a strategy at workplaces.

"Lots of companies are experimenting with rewarding people for weight loss, and this study provides evidence that paying people to lose weight works," says Eric Finkelstein, a health economist with RTI International, a non-profit research organization in Research Triangle Park, N.C.

He teamed with researchers at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill to recruit more than 200 overweight or obese employees in North Carolina. A third were given no financial reward for their weight loss after three months; a third were given $7 for every 1 percent drop in their body weight; a third were given $14 for every 1 percent decrease. The participants were not given a structured diet and fitness program.

After three months, those who received no money lost an average of 2 pounds. Those in the $7 group lost 3 pounds; those in the $14 group lost 5 pounds.

Participants in the $14 group were more than five times more likely to lose 5 percent of their weight, an amount shown to provide health benefits. The findings are reported in September's Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine.

Finkelstein says it's still unclear whether participants will be able to keep the weight off and whether paying people to lose weight is a profitable strategy for companies.

About 66 percent of people in the USA are overweight or obese, which increases their risk of heart disease, diabetes, cancer and other illnesses. Health experts consider a person obese if he or she is 30 or more pounds over a healthy weight; overweight is 1 to 29 pounds over that standard.

Obesity has been linked to higher medical bills, greater absenteeism, reduced productivity, increased worker-compensation costs and higher disability expenses, Finkelstein says.