Impatience, incentives and obesity

Economic Journal

Volumn 125, Issue 582, 2015, Pages 1-31

  Courtemanche, Charles ^a   Heutel, Garth ^b   Mcalvanah, Patrick ^c  

^a GEORGIA STATE UNIVERSITY   (United States)

^b UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA AT GREENSBORO   (United States)

^c FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 84921312074     PISSN: 00130133     EISSN: 14680297     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/ecoj.12124     Document Type: Article

References (54)

1. Anderson, L. and Mellor, J. (2008). 'Predicting health behaviors with an experimental measure of risk preference', Journal of Health Economics, vol. 27(5), pp. 1260-74.
2. Becker, G., Grossman, M. and Murphy, K. (1991). 'Rational addiction and the effect of price on consumption', American Economic Review, vol. 81(2), pp. 237-41.
3. Bernheim, B. and Rangel, A. (2009). 'Beyond revealed preference: choice-theoretic foundations for behavioral welfare economics', Quarterly Journal of Economics, vol. 124(1), pp. 51-104.
4. Bhattacharya, J. and Sood, N. (2011). 'Who pays for obesity?' Journal of Economic Perspectives, vol. 25(1), pp. 139-58.
5. Borghans, L. and Golsteyn, B. (2006). 'Time discounting and the body mass index: evidence from the Netherlands', Economics and Human Biology, vol. 4(1), pp. 29-61.
6. Cadena, B. and Keys, B. (2011). 'Human capital and the lifetime costs of impatience', Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1674068 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1674068 (last accessed: 19 March 2014).
7. Cawley, J. (1999). 'Rational addiction, the consumption of calories, and body weight', Ph.D. dissertation, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL.
8. Chabris, C., Laibson, D., Morris, C., Schuldt, J. and Taubinsky, D.(2008). 'Individual laboratory-measured discount rates predict field behavior', Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, vol. 37(2-3), pp. 237-69.
9. Chaloupka, F. (1991). 'Rational addictive behavior and cigarette smoking', Journal of Political Economy, vol. 99(4), pp. 722-42.
10. Chou, S., Grossman, M. and Saffer, H. (2004). 'An economic analysis of adult obesity: results from the behavioral risk factor surveillance system', Journal of Health Economics, vol. 23(3), pp. 565-87.
11. Chung, C. and Myers, S.L. (1999). 'Do the poor pay more for food? An analysis of grocery store availability and food price disparities', Journal of Consumer Affairs, vol. 33(2), pp. 276-96.
12. Coller, M. and Williams, M. (1999). 'Eliciting individual discount rates', Experimental Economics, vol. 2(2), pp. 107-27.
13. Courtemanche, C. and Carden, A. (2011). 'Supersizing supercenters? The impact of Walmart Supercenters on body mass index and obesity', Journal of Urban Economics, vol. 69(2), pp. 165-81.
14. Cutler, D., Glaeser, E. and Shapiro, J. (2003). 'Why have Americans become more obese?', Journal of Economic Perspectives, vol. 17(3), pp. 93-118.
15. DellaVigna, S. and Paserman, M.D. (2005). 'Job search and impatience', Journal of Labor Economics, vol. 23(3), pp. 527-88.
16. Finkelstein, E., Fiebelkorn, I. and Wang, G. (2003). 'National medical spending attributable to overweight and obesity: how much, and who's paying?' Health Affairs, Web Exclusives: pp. W219-26.
17. Flegal, K., Carroll, M., Kuczmarski, R. and Johnson, C. (1998). 'Overweight and obesity in the United States: prevalence and trends, 1960-1994', International Journal of Obesity, vol. 22(1), pp. 39-47.
18. Flegal, K., Graubard, B., Williamson, D. and Gail, M. (2005). 'Excess deaths associated with underweight, overweight, and obesity', Journal of the American Medical Association, vol. 293(15), pp. 1861-67.
19. Goldman, D., Lakdawalla, D. and Zheng, Y. (2011). 'Food prices and the dynamics of body weight', in (M. Grossman and N. Mocan, eds.), Economic Aspects of Obesity, pp. 65-90, Chicago IL: University of Chicago Press.
20. Gruber, J. and Koszegi, B. (2001). 'Is addiction "rational"? Theory and evidence', Quarterly Journal of Economics, vol. 116(4), pp. 1261-303.
21. Heutel, G. (2011). 'Optimal policy instruments for externality-producing durable goods under time inconsistency', Working Paper 17083, National Bureau of Economic Research.
22. Ikeda, S., Kang, M. and Ohtake, F. (2010). 'Hyperbolic discounting, the sign effect, and the body mass index', Journal of Health Economics, vol. 29(2), pp. 268-84.
23. Johnson, M.W. and Bickel, W.K. (2002). 'Within-subject comparison of real and hypothetical money rewards in delay discounting', Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, vol. 77(2), pp. 129-46.
24. Kirby, K. and Marakovic, N. (1995). 'Modeling myopic decisions: evidence for hyperbolic delay-discounting within subjects and amounts', Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, vol. 64(1), pp. 22-30.
25. Komlos, J., Smith, P. and Bogin, B. (2004). 'Obesity and the rate of time preference: is there a connection?', Journal of Biosocial Science, vol. 36(2), pp. 209-19.
26. Laibson, D. (1997). 'Golden eggs and hyperbolic discounting', Quarterly Journal of Economics, vol. 112(2), pp. 443-77.
27. Lakdawalla, D. and Philipson, T. (2009). 'The growth of obesity and technological change', Economics & Human Biology, vol. 7(3), pp. 283-93.
28. Lakdawalla, D., Philipson, T. and Bhattacharya, J. (2005). 'Welfare-enhancing technological change and the growth of obesity', American Economic Review Papers and Proceedings, vol. 95(2), pp. 253-57.
29. Loewenstein, G. (1988). 'Frames of mind in intertemporal choice', Management Science, vol. 34(2), pp. 200-14.
30. Madden, G.J., Begotka, A.M., Raiff, B.R. and Kastern, L.L. (2003). 'Delay discounting of real and hypothetical rewards', Experimental and Clinical Psychopharmacology, vol. 11(2), pp. 139-45.
31. McAlvanah, P. (2010). 'Subadditivity, patience, and utility: the effects of dividing time intervals', Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, vol. 76(2), pp. 325-37.
32. Meier, S. and Sprenger, C. (2010). 'Stability of time preferences', Working Paper 4756, Institute for the Study of Labour (IZA).
33. National Center of Health Statistics (2008). 'Prevalence of overweight, obesity and extreme obesity among adults: United States, trends 1976-80 through 2005-2006', http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/hestat/overweight/overweight_adult.pdf (last accessed: 19 March 2014).
34. National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (2008). 'Longitudinal assessment of bariatric surgery (LABS)', No. 04-5573, NIH publication.
35. O'Donoghue, T. and Rabin, M. (2006). 'Optimal sin taxes', Journal of Public Economics, vol. 90(10-11), pp. 1825-49.
36. Ogden, C., Carroll, M., Kit, B. and Flegal, K. (2012). 'Prevalence of obesity in the United States, 2009-2010', NCHS Data Brief no. 82, US Department of Health and Human Services.
37. Percoco, M. and Nijkamp, P. (2009). 'Estimating individual rates of discount: a meta-analysis', Applied Economics Letters, vol. 16(12), pp. 1235-39.
38. Phelps, E.S. and Pollak, R. (1968). 'On second-best national saving and game-equilibrium growth', Review of Economic Studies, vol. 35(2), pp. 185-99.
39. Philipson, T. and Posner, R. (2003). 'The long-run growth in obesity as a function of technological change', Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, vol. 46(3), pp. S87-107.
40. Royer, H., Stehr, M. and Snydor, J. (2012). 'Incentives, commitments and habit formation in exercise: evidence from a field experiment with workers at a fortune-500 company', NBER Working Paper 18580.
41. Ruhm, C. (2012). 'Understanding overeating and obesity', Journal of Health Economics, vol. 31(6), pp. 781-96.
42. Scharff, R. (2009). 'Obesity and hyperbolic discounting: evidence and implications', Journal of Consumer Policy, vol. 32(1), pp. 3-21.
43. Seeyave, D., Coleman, S., Appugliese, D., Corwyn, R., Bradley, R., Davidson, N., Kaciroti, N. and Lumeng, J. (2009). 'Ability to delay gratification at age 4 years and risk of oveweight at age 11 years', Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, vol. 163(4), pp. 303-8.
44. Shelley, M. (1993). 'Outcome signs, question frames, and discount rates', Management Science, vol. 39(7), pp. 806-15.
45. Simpson, C. and Vuchinich, R. (2000). 'Reliability of a measure of temporal discounting', Psychological Record, vol. 50(1), pp. 3-16.
46. Smith, P., Bogin, B. and Bishai, D. (2005). 'Are time preference and body mass index associated? Evidence from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth', Economics and Human Biology, vol. 3(2), pp. 259-70.
47. Sturm, R. (2002). 'The effects of obesity, smoking, and drinking on medical problems and costs', Health Affairs, vol. 21(2), pp. 245-53.
48. Sutter, M., Kocher, M., Rutzler, D. and Trautmann, S. (2013). 'Impatience and uncertainty: experimental decisions predict adolescents' field behavior', American Economic Review, vol. 103(1), pp. 510-31.
49. Townsend, J. (1987). 'Cigarette tax, economic welfare and social class patterns of smoking', Applied Economics, vol. 19(3), pp. 355-65.
50. Ubfal, D., 2012. 'How general are time preferences? Eliciting good-specific discount rates', Discussion Paper 6774, Institute for the Study of Labour (IZA).
51. US Department of Health and Human Services (2001). 'The surgeon general's call to action to prevent and decrease overweight and obesity', available at, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK44206/ (last accessed 19 March 2014).
52. Van der Pol, M. (2011). 'Health, education and time preference', Health Economics, vol. 20(8), pp. 917-29.
53. Weller, R., Cook, E., Avsar, K. and Cox, J. (2008). 'Obese women show greater delay discounting than healthy-weight women', Appetite, vol. 51(3), pp. 563-9.
54. Zhang, L. and Rashad, I. (2008). 'Obesity and time preference: the health consequences of discounting the future', Journal of Biosocial Science, vol. 40(1), pp. 97-113.