Desk Jobs Make People Fat

The problem with exercise is that it just doesn’t burn that many calories. And any calories that it does use are very easily replaced with very small changes in diet.

A quick bit of maths on a calorie counter tells us that the average overweight officeworker will burn up to 100 more Calories in their daily 30 minutes of moderate exercise than they would have if they had been sitting at their desk.

A 34oz bottle of Coke (or orange juice) contains 2 solid hours worth of Calories at that burn rate. So why not skip the drink and the two hours of jogging and call it a day?

Early morning Japan, if you drive by a construction site you can see 50 plus people (men and women) doing jumping jacks. My wife is a computer programmer and from the president down they, do stretching and *jumping jacks for 5 min every day.
*jumping jack is the wrong word - I dont know how to describe the funky thing they do.

This makes total sense and I've lived it. I spent many years working in service jobs where you spend most of your time standing and moving. When I went back to college a few years ago I found myself sitting most of the day although I did hit the gym about 5 days a week. It was too easy to gain weight. When I graduated, I worked in a paint store for the first year before finding a job in my chosen profession. I lost about 20lb in just a few months, just from being more active daily. Once I got my sit down job, I noticed I put on that 20lb and I continue to struggle with them. To me there is no doubt a more active lifestyle helps maintain a good weight.

Years ago, people worked harder doing more manual labour. Now, thanks to technology, we have machines that do the heavy lifting. Even in the office with email, we don't walk about visiting people we need to speak with, we just email them. Look at drive thru, people don't even have to get out of their cars anymore, and they don't. The world's been made way too easy for us to become lazy and inefficient. Remember that movie last year, Wall-E? I know some overweight folks took offense to that, but I believe it was a commentary on how we live our lives and where we are possibly going.

Each hour, I climb 118 stairwell steps at the office, then stretch before returning to my desk. It only takes a minute! And I sometimes get in an hour walk during lunch.

It's all about what you want. There's really no excuse.

it really is all about your priorities. if you cared enough about your health (and yes, your looks too), you would find a way to eat healthy and fit in physical activity no matter what your job is.

my job entails sitting at a desk for 10 hours a day. i'm determined to keep the desk job spread at bay by maintaining my 3x a week gym habit and by strictly watching what i eat. every little thing counts! on days i don't go to the gym, i climb 8 stories' of stairs to my office. i drink plenty of water, which means plenty of bathroom trips, and on each of those bathroom trips, i never sit on the toilet seat. i squat. it really shapes the quads, hamstrings and buttocks. some people think i'm obsessed. but what they don't realize is that these little things add up and make a real difference over time.

No, the people behind the desks that do their job without a balanced lifestyle make THEMSELVES fat.

My husband blames his desk job on his weight gain. When he was a mechanic and tow truck driver, he was on his feet the whole day and he was using his muscles to lift things and just generally be active. Now that he sits around all day, I think he probably lost some muscle mass, which made it easy for him to put on a few pounds. So even though some of you claim that working out doesn't burn "that many" calories, you can't forget that it helps maintain muscle mass, which helps you burn more calories even when you aren't working out.

Since becoming a deputy, my dh has had a very difficult time maintaining a healthy weight (the guy who used to be TOO skinny!) even though he runs four times a week.

I try to do the whole park far away, take walks on my breaks thing and I usually end up with 8000-10000 steps on my pedometer every day, in addition to weight training and six days of cardio a week. It's still a struggle.

Sounds like a good idea to encourage people to be up and moving more during the work day. It would be even better if those experts promoting the incentive-based fitness programs also included dietary interventions in their suggestions, or even just considered some type of incentives for companies who serve healthier meal choices in their cafeterias. The Zone Diet and lifestyle would be my suggestion. Employers would benefit in many ways, including enhanced quality of work from their employees.

Many people work long hours at desk jobs but still find time to exercise & eat better. Like another said, you have to make it a priority. Been there & done that working long hours when I was younger. Look at Yum Yucky walking the stairs!

As for work places, they love to say they want to help their employees get healthy but yet they don't want them eating at their desk so if you are a mini meal person, forget it. They want you in countless meetings, working countless hours, stay late, get there early and so on. Hey, I know there are better companies out there but from my experience, they do nothing to help you achieve health goals and you just have to make it your priority to do it yourself.

To MOST folks 'exercise' is a four letter word.
Between mAss media and enviornment/livestyle, most folks are brain washed into becoming fat for the profits of many companies.
Been thar, got streach pants to prove it.

Well there was a recent study out that showed that a job where you sit all day (regardless of your weight or whatever other exercise you did) meant that you had a vastly elevated mortality rate. In many companies in Japan, exercise is a prerequisite for getting and keeping your job because they say it increases productivity and mental alertness.