Lakdawalla, Darius, and Tomas Philipson. 2007. “Labor Supply and Weight.” Journal of Human Resources 42(1): 85–116.
We use panel data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth to investigate on-the-job exercise and weight. For male workers, job-related exercise has causal effects on weight, but for female workers, the effects seem primarily selective. A man who spends 18 years in the most physical fitness-demanding occupation is about 25 pounds (14 percent) lighter than his peer in the least demanding occupation. These effects are strongest for the heaviest quartile of men. Conversely, a male worker spending 18 years in the most strength-demanding occupation is about 28 pounds (15 percent) heavier than his counterpart in the least demanding job.
Darius Lakdawalla is a senior economist at the RAND Corporation. Tomas Philipson is a professor of economics at the University of Chicago. The authors wish to thank seminar participants at AEI, The University of Chicago, Columbia University, Harvard University, MIT, The University of Minnesota, The University of Toronto, UCLA, Yale University, the 2001 American Economic Association Meetings, the 2001 Population Association of America Meetings, the 12th Annual Health Economics Conference, Gary Becker, Shankha Chakraborty, Mark Duggan, Michael Grossman, Bob Kaestner, John Mullahy, Casey Mulligan, Richard Posner, and Chris Ruhm. Erin Krupka provided excellent research assistance. Darius Lakdawalla thanks the RAND Institute for Civil Justice for financial support. The data used in this article can be obtained beginning August 2007 through July 2010 from Darius Lakdawalla, RAND Corporation, 1776 Main Street, Santa Monica, CA 90407, darius@rand.org.