Is obesity a class thing?

obesity and income are the link,I live in an area of high deprivation ,where factories have closed and any jobs available tend to be minimum wage .I see people walking home for the freezer shops on a Monday with 4 or 5 bags of cheap food to last them the week.High fat ,lots of carbs what a lot of us would consider junk food ...but they are doing their best to keep a roof over their families heads and food ,however poor the quality,on the table.IF you've ever struggled then you'll have sympathy and admiration for the millions who have no choice but to live like this.We struggled when we started out in our business and lived on toasted cheese for over 2 years at one stage ,but there wasn't the variety of cheap food around so perhaps we were lucky...and we were always active which helps too.But being active when life is tough isn't easy either so I would never look down at people who do their best for their families whatever weight they are or if they smoke etc.Just be glad you dont have to walk in their shoes

Good post Paddy

I struggle to find the answer to this question because surely obesity comes in all sizes -classes- of society? My DH went to a posh boarding school with lots of healthy food, but he turned out fat because he always used to eat up all the second and third helpings! Now it's the best wines, (around £20 a bottle), plus aperitifs, so income is not the link here. If anything it's portion sizes and an actual enjoyment of tastes, if that's possible.

I do object to the EU fat ruling which classes obese people as "disabled", but I do have to agree it's unusual to see fat French people and UK citizens are fatter than even the Germans.

Very true, paddy, I think.

All I know is that if a tv programme shows topical film footage from the 70s or earlier everyone looks very slender!

Oh and another comment - when I was a rather sturdy teenager - a good size 16, though in inches it would be a size 14 now.......I had a hell of a job to find jeans to fit. Nowadays high street fashion can be found in very generous sizes - has this lead to a more general acceptance of bigger people? A sort of chicken/egg thing? No idea.

This is not class but age. Whilst many of us, including me, have put on weight as we have got older, I noticed on holiday with my DGC at a caravan site that the Grans were usually slimmish or a little plump but many of the Mums were obese. Every very large woman I saw was young. Are there more overweight people in some parts of the country than others? I'm from London and don't see so many at home.

No excuse for smoking at nearly £8 a pack now lots of help out there for free to help you stop and if you are obese and smoke you will become a burden to the NHS.

I'm from London and don't see so many at home.
That is exactly my observation too GM, Londoners are unlikely to be obese. They are always chasing up escalators and sipping their cups of coffee, (not munching food).

I think we're heading towards the US situation now, where overweight people look around and see other people as large as themselves so don't think they're overweight..

Lillie that'll be the cups of coffee that cost a few pounds a time...the people I'm talking about cant AFFORD those coffees,the price of one would probably feed their family a complete meal from the freezer shop .Shame so many are so narrow in outlook .I'd guess if you went to some of the less well off areas of London you'll see just as many overweight folk as there are everywhere else

I very much doubt that London people are slimmer than elsewhere. I suppose, again, it would depend on the area.

Twas purely an observation paddyann, and we all notice different markers. Just like I notice Londoners walk faster than people in other cities - apparently it's all down to economic output.
Now, time to run for the tube, (that's 100 calories off!)

devongirl and paddy I think you are both quite right. Now that so many people are seriously overweight it is becoming the norm. A very frightening prospect and one that our NHS just cannot cope with.

I think people have been rather harsh on the OP - I also see a big difference in attitudes towards obesity depending on the financial/housing/job situation. Of course there are thin people on benefits, and fat people on round the world cruises. I don't know what the answer is but feel a lot of young people in particular have lost their responsibility to look after themselves for the sake of their future.

Maybe all the 'upper class' obese people are just better at hiding away in their big cars and big houses ...

blaming the us for uk obesity is ridiculous.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fast_food_restaurant_chains

granted the usa list is longer but a huge amount of these are regional and the usa is 37.92 x larger than the entire uk.
urban areas have more fast food places.
yes convenience and cheap prices contributes.
so do genetics,excercise,and for us ladies menopause is the enemy.

economics concerns it as well .fresh fruit and veg are expensive,some citys have very little available.and its usually very small green grocers with high prices.

those fizzy cokes are 140 calories per can
same amount of 100% oj is about the same???

no one cause no one answer

even food banks cannot really help.most food is tinned or packaged rarely fresh/no ability to store it
our food bank has a different take on things,we worked hard to get local farmers and grocers to contribute fresh,but it took years of door knocking and pleading.local first responders came and turned one of our rooms into a cold storage room.
education is another factor,few schools have cooking classes any more much less nutritional educationrealized that when friends daughter caught kitchen on fire trying to boil an egg.(she just let it boil on and on til the water was gone.)

I'm always surprised that some areas of cities don't have good access to high-quality cheap fruit & veg. I think Aldi & Lidl have done a really good job there, not only in selling it themselves but in keeping the prices low in the other large supermarkets.
I can remember reading about 'food deserts' in Bristol - I was gobsmacked.

Think you are just making excuses mimiro, diet cheap coke is available, cheap fruit and vegetables offers in Tesco, Lidl and Aldi @ 49p. Personally I don't think it's a shortage of money that's the problem you only have to look at different families shopping trolley to see some are piled high with snacks, crisps, biscuits and cakes as well as their normal shopping for meals I am amazed at how much some people spend.

Perhaps the "lower classes" (aka poorer people) have different jobs to the middle classes. They work where you don't wear a business suit, or a "smart casual" outfit, and you don't get your hair done and your nails painted so as to present a smart face to the public. Instead you wear a practical uniform or a nylon overall, or something that can get dirty and be thrown into the washing machine at the end of the day. There isn't the same incentive to be slim and elegant all day when no-one else beside you cares what you look like, and when you finish work you don't suddenly turn from a pumpkin into a fairy godmother.

I agree, ninny - I was going to say the same thing.
I very rarely buy frozen food so don't know the price compared with fresh.
eg how much are a bag of frozen chicken drumsticks, and a bag of frozen chips?

Frozen is cheaper than fresh. Its that simple.. just as organic is more expensive than ordinary fruit and veg, and the same for meat.

Here's one example:
groceries.iceland.co.uk/search?w=frozen%20chicken&ref=http%3A%2F%2Fgroceries.iceland.co.uk%2Fbrand%2Fworld-famous
Yes they are cheaper than what I buy.

It shouldn't make any difference though for staple foods, in fact frozen is better - frozen veg is fresher, no waste and no preparation.

So, for a family of 4, a pack of chicken steaks and a bag of chips could be three pounds.

Personally because I often cook for one, I usually by frozen; but it seems to me when I go to Iceland that it is possible to buy multiple-serving packs surprisingly cheaply (per head)..

The OP is correct in that statistically people from lower income backgrounds are more likely to be overweight than people from higher income groups. That doesn't mean no one who is poor is thin or vice versa. In the past it was a sign of wealth to be fat, now that isn't the case. Sociologists suggest several reasons for this, most of those explanations have been described in this thread- cheaper foods which require less preparation tend to be higher calorie foods. A bag of chips is more filling than a bowl of salad and more of a treat. etc