Getting Paid to Lose Weight? More Workers are Trying It

By Robert Lewis, InsWeb.com

Need a financial incentive to lose weight? How does $100, $200, or even $500 sound?

Many employers are using “dieting for dollars” programs to encourage workers to slim down. Employees who lose weight are offered rewards, such as gift certificates or reduced health insurance premiums, additional vacation time or—everyone’s favorite—cold hard cash.

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To increase productivity and keep health insurance premiums low, some employers are paying workers to slim down.

It’s like your own personal version of The Biggest Loser: the more weight you lose, the more money you win.

As many as one-third of American companies offer financial incentives, or plan to introduce them, to coax their employees to lose weight, according to the Center for Health Incentives at the University of Pennsylvania.

Some employers refund the cost of Weight Watchers classes; others reward workers for simply completing a health evaluation or enrolling in a class.

Thus far, the programs have had mixed success.

One hospital chain with an overweight workforce paid employees for wearing pedometers and walking as much as they could. The more the employee walked, the more money he received, up to $500 per year. The program was a hit. Half of the chain’s employees signed up for the program and many workers report losing a significant amount of weight.

But other programs haven’t been as successful. A Cornell study looked at seven employer programs and found discouraging results: The average weight loss for employees was just one pound.

But motivation is a factor. Psychologists say humans are more motivated by the danger of losing their own money than by the prospect of winning someone else’s. The study found that workers who put their own cash on the line lost one pound more, on average, than those who won prizes alone.

With two-thirds of Americans overweight and one-third obese, critics say it’s unlikely that these “dieting for dollars” programs will make a significant impact. But for a small number of highly motivated people, they may provide the spark they need to achieve long-lasting weight loss.