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The Effect of Fast Food Restaurants on Obesity and Weight Gain

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  • Janet Currie
  • Stefano DellaVigna
  • Enrico Moretti
  • Vikram Pathania

Abstract

We investigate the health consequences of changes in the supply of fast food using the exact geographical location of fast food restaurants. Specifically, we ask how the supply of fast food affects the obesity rates of 3 million school children and the weight gain of over 3 million pregnant women. We find that among 9th grade children, a fast food restaurant within a tenth of a mile of a school is associated with at least a 5.2 percent increase in obesity rates. There is no discernable effect at .25 miles and at .5 miles. Among pregnant women, models with mother fixed effects indicate that a fast food restaurant within a half mile of her residence results in a 1.6 percent increase in the probability of gaining over 20 kilos, with a larger effect at .1 miles. The effect is significantly larger for African-American and less educated women. For both school children and mothers, the presence of non-fast food restaurants is uncorrelated with weight outcomes. Moreover, proximity to future fast food restaurants is uncorrelated with current obesity and weight gain, conditional on current proximity to fast food. The implied effects of fast-food on caloric intake are at least one order of magnitude larger for students than for mothers, consistent with smaller travel cost for adults.

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Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 14721.

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Date of creation: Feb 2009
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:14721

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  1. Anderson, Michael L. & Matsa, David A., 2008. "Are restuarants really supersizing America?," CUDARE Working Paper Series 1056R4, University of California at Berkeley, Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Policy, revised Jul 2010.
  2. Burkhauser, Richard V. & Cawley, John, 2008. "Beyond BMI: The value of more accurate measures of fatness and obesity in social science research," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 27(2), pages 519-529, March.
  3. Sara Bleich & David Cutler & Christopher Murray & Alyce Adams, 2007. "Why Is The Developed World Obese?," NBER Working Papers 12954, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  4. Joseph G. Altonji & Todd E. Elder & Christopher R. Taber, 2000. "Selection on Observed and Unobserved Variables: Assessing the Effectiveness of Catholic Schools," NBER Working Papers 7831, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  5. Cawley, John & Liu, Feng, 2012. "Maternal employment and childhood obesity: A search for mechanisms in time use data," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 10(4), pages 352-364.
  6. Shin-Yi Chou & Michael Grossman & Henry Saffer, 2002. "An Economic Analysis of Adult Obesity: Results from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System," NBER Working Papers 9247, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  7. Darius Lakdawalla & Tomas Philipson, 2002. "The Growth of Obesity and Technological Change: A Theoretical and Empirical Examination," NBER Working Papers 8946, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  8. Patricia M. Anderson & Kristin Butcher, 2004. "Reading, writing, and raisinets: are school finances contributing to children’s obesity?," Working Paper Series WP-04-16, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.
  9. Patricia M. Anderson & Kristin F. Butcher & Phillip B. Levine, 2002. "Maternal Employment and Overweight Children," NBER Working Papers 8770, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
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Cited by:
  1. Pieroni, Luca & Salmasi, Luca, 2010. "Body weight and socio-economic determinants: quantile estimations from the British Household Panel Survey," MPRA Paper 26434, University Library of Munich, Germany.
  2. Tafreschi, Darjusch, 2011. "The Income Body Weight Gradients in the Developing Economy of China," Economics Working Paper Series 1140, University of St. Gallen, School of Economics and Political Science.
  3. David O. Meltzer & Zhuo Chen, 2009. "The Impact of Minimum Wage Rates on Body Weight in the United States," NBER Working Papers 15485, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  4. Courtemanche, Charles & Carden, Art, 2008. "Supersizing Supercenters? The Impact of Wal-Mart Supercenters on Body Mass Index and Obesity," Working Papers 09-3, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Department of Economics, revised 29 Jan 2009.
  5. Ver Ploeg, Michele & Dutko, Paula & Snyder, Samantha D. & Kaufman, Phillip R. & Breneman, Vincent E. & Williams, Ryan Blake & Dicken, Chris, 2012. "Enhanced Data and Methods for Estimating Access to Affordable and Nutritious Food for Population Characteristics," 2012 Annual Meeting, August 12-14, 2012, Seattle, Washington 124703, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
  6. Akee, Randall K. Q. & Simeonova, Emilia & Copeland, William & Angold, Adrian & Costello, Jane E., 2010. "Does More Money Make You Fat? The Effects of Quasi-Experimental Income Transfers on Adolescent and Young Adult Obesity," IZA Discussion Papers 5135, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).
  7. Chen, Susan E. & Florax, Raymond J.G.M. & Snyder, Samantha D., 2009. "Obesity in Urban Food Markets: Evidence from Geo-referenced Micro Data," 2009 Annual Meeting, July 26-28, 2009, Milwaukee, Wisconsin 49512, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
  8. Delia Furtado & Nikolaos Theodoropoulos, 2012. "Immigrant Networks and the Take-Up of Disability Programs: Evidence from US Census Data," University of Cyprus Working Papers in Economics 09-2012, University of Cyprus Department of Economics.
  9. Brendan O'Flaherty, 2011. "Rental Housing Assistance for the 21st Century," Discussion Papers 1011-09, Columbia University, Department of Economics.
  10. John F. Tomer, 2010. "What Causes Obesity? And Why Has it Grown So Much? An Alternative View," Papers on Economics and Evolution 2010-12, Max Planck Institute of Economics, Evolutionary Economics Group.
  11. Papoutsi, Georgia & Drichoutis, Andreas & Nayga, Rodolfo, 2011. "The causes of childhood obesity: A survey," MPRA Paper 30992, University Library of Munich, Germany.
  12. Mary A. Burke & Frank W. Heiland, 2011. "Explaining gender-specific racial differences in obesity using biased self-reports of food intake," Working Papers 11-2, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston.
  13. Courtemanche, Charles & McAlvanah, Patrick & Heutel, Garth, 2011. "Impatience, Incentives, and Obesity," Working Papers 11-9, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Department of Economics, revised 28 Sep 2011.
  14. Bonanno, Alessandro & Goetz, Stephan J., 2012. "Food Store Density, Nutrition Education, Eating Habits and Obesity," International Food and Agribusiness Management Review, International Food and Agribusiness Management Association (IAMA), vol. 15(4).
  15. Okrent, Abigail M. & Alston, Julian M., 2012. "The Demand for Disaggregated Food-Away-from-Home and Food-at-Home Products in the United States," Economic Research Report 132469, United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service.
  16. Li, Lan, 2012. "An Empirical Analysis of Fruit and Vegetable Consumption and Its Relationship to Adult Obesity in the U.S," 2012 Annual Meeting, August 12-14, 2012, Seattle, Washington 125002, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
  17. Mancino, Lisa & Todd, Jessica E. & Guthrie, Joanne F. & Lin, Biing-Hwan, 2010. "How Food Away From Home Affects Children's Diet Quality," Economic Research Report 134700, United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service.

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