"Presenteeism" costs the workplace plenty.

• Position: YOUR LIFE

The cost of obesity among U.S. full-time employees is estimated to be $73,100,000,000, according to a study published in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine. This is the first study to quantify the total value of lost job productivity as a result of health problems, which it finds is more costly than medical expenditures.

The study quantified the per capita cost of obesity among full-time workers by considering three factors: employee medical expenditures, lost productivity on the job due to health problems (presenteeism), and absence from work (absenteeism). Collectively, the per capita costs of obesity are as high as $16,900 for obese women with a body mass index (BMI) over 40 (roughly 100 pounds overweight) and $15,500 for obese men in the same BMI class.

Presenteeism makes up the largest share of those costs. Researcher Eric Finkelstein, funded by Allergan, Inc., found that presenteeism accounts for as much as 56% of the total cost of obesity for women and 68% for men. Even among those in the normal weight range, the value of lost productivity due to health problems tar exceeds the medical costs.

As part of this secondary analysis of the 2006 Medical Expenditure Panel Survey and...