I really dont think its the benefit of the American taxpayer to allow the goverment to pay people to lose weight. I understand it could, could being the operative term, cut insurance costs but theres no guarantee that it would. Meanwhile our tax dollars would be wasted on getting some people to slim down. Whos fault is it that they are that way? I certainly didnt force them to eat that extra box of chocolates nor did I force them engage in other bad eating habits. I understand the idea of money incentives in order to stimulate a desire to lose weight. Well I say reverse it. Make them pay the government for being fat. After al someone might be more inclined to do this if they are being forced to pay out. If they lose the weight they will eventually not have to pay at all. How about using negative reinforcement instead of positive reinforcement in this case? Now before you go out and scream that my proposal is unfair. What about those of us that do maintain our weight and eat healthy? Isnt paying fatties to lose weight unfair to us? What are we being rewarded with? Increased taxes to pay for the fat proposal.

I understand what you mean. In high school, I was consistently angry because I had the highest GPA in my class, yet the school continually rewarded the "most improved" students with gift certificates to the local mall, etc. I believe the reasoning was that those students needed to be pushed, while students like me obviously didn't need an incentive to be responsible.

On another post, someone mentioned a tax cut for those living a "healthy lifestyle" - within weight range, nonsmoker, etc. If we socialize medicine then this would be a great way to encourage people to lose weight, I think. If the government (state-by-state) decided to pay for pounds (hee I just thought of the program's name!) then maybe it would be a one-shot deal.

However, as things stand, the government shouldn't pay people for any sort of medical issue since medicine is supposed to be privately operated. If Blue Shield wants to pay their customers to lose weight, then hooray for Blue Shield. It may even convince some people to switch insurance carriers, which could be a profit for the companies in the long run (since the companies would now have a bunch of people who are newly committed to being healthy signing up for insurance).

You are so ridiculous that you started a thread of your own and then went and posted the EXACT SAME thing on every other thread. Get a life.

parker:

You are so ridiculous that you started a thread of your own and then went and posted the EXACT SAME thing on every other thread. Get a life.

I could say the exact same thing about you. Troll much?