Comment by teslabox | Hacker News Reader

Comment by teslabox | Hacker News Reader

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The turning point was right around 1980. If we can figure out what changed then, we can correct course. I think what happened around 1980 was only a spark to the kindling that'd been prepared by a series of mistakes starting in the 1950's.

Obesity in Females: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obesity_in_the_United_States#/...

Obesity in Males: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obesity_in_the_United_States#/...

(graphs from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obesity_in_the_United_States )

"Trends in obesity among children and adolescents ages 2–19 years, by age: United States, 1963–1965 through 2017–2018": https://www.niddk.nih.gov/-/media/Images/Health-Information/... (from https://www.niddk.nih.gov/health-information/health-statisti... )

When did people really stop smoking? Tobacco may have been supplying a pseudo Ozempic weight management effect while it was dominant.

Tobacco use peaked in the late 50's - but who knows maybe it's a lagging thing.

Ronald Reagan happened

Cable TV started growing as did Satellite TV

The baby boomers started coming of age

We started piling up mountains of debt government, commercial and consumer

As a society we started to party, it hasn’t stopped since, people are so stupid rich that they support several multi billion dollar corporations which do nothing but ferry food someone else makes to your grubby little paws. To add insult to injury they charge service fees, and markup menu items and on top of all that you have to tip the driver. you spend 2x the cost of the food to get it delivered half cold and soggy.

This is all normal and celebrated even, and then we wonder why everyone is overweight

Society, as a complex system, is always undergoing turning point transformation on sets of sub systems. It's possible to construe 'turning point' narratives about any well documented time period.

Yeah, Reagan definitely made me fat. What a jerk!

GP is not completely off. The middle class was squeezed after the Reagan administration and inequality soared. If you have two parents working multiple jobs to make ends meet, you end up consuming more processed foods (that save time and money) and having a less healthy diet.

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