Fat tax, just like Japan. You want to be a fat ass, and drain resources, then you pay for it. Just like car insurance. You want to drive dangerous sports cars, then you pay a higher price to cover liability.
You can try complicate the explanations to account for this but the fact is that it shows that the 'obvious' reasons most people surmise are not so clear cut and need to be tested like any hypothesis. It's a hard problem to test and there are several other competing hypothesis. The best I can say for my own beliefs is that we need to have more studies that need to be done before I'm convinced of any of them.
I explain this here:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14353914
It's cheaper to not exercise.
Also exercise is not for weight loss, it's for exercise.
Also works for saving: earn more and spend less, duh!
Making friends: be nice more and mean less, duh!
Stress: sleep and relax more and worry less, duh!
Marriage: communicate and date more and fight less, duh!
Fat people want to be thinner. There are plenty of negative incentives to being fat. There's something subtler and more complex going on here.
Not too surprising that being immune or actively avoiding that toxic culture, results in both wealth and fitness.
Advertising Kills.
Not saying something like that might not be a good idea from a public health perspective. I'm not educated enough on those issues to have an opinion.
Yet here you are, posting things like this:
> The problem with that logic is that people with unhealthy behavior actually cost the system less.
Without any data.
I posted what I am educated about, and did not post an opinion about what I am not educated about.
> Without any data.
Apologies. I posted a nytimes story that links to a study in another comment in this thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14353347
From a public health perspective yes that absolutely matters, but all I'm saying is this narrow claim: You will not save money on medical costs if you get your population to act healthier and they die of unpreventable diseases instead of preventable ones.
Nobody? Really?
What you're proposing is to pile additional hardship on people who are likely already unhappy with their current situation, and may also feel powerless to fix that part of their lives. On its face, your proposal lacks both compassion and efficacy.
It's also horribly authoritarian, and would likely discourage people from seeking preventative health care, just because the nurses weigh you at your office visit. Think about the potential unintended consequences before firing off a glib, "fix it with market incentives" proposal, paired with reasoning by [car] analogy.