Slashdot Mirror
IT Workers Are Getting Fatter
buzzardsbay writes "While technologies such as virtualization, multi-threading, and blade servers have made the data center leaner, those who work there are getting... well... not leaner. According to a new study by CareerBuilder.com, 34 percent of IT workers say they have gained more than ten pounds in their current jobs. And 16 percent say they've gained at least twice that. The culprits seem to be the stressful-yet-sedentary nature of tech work coupled with our famously poor eating habits. According to the survey, some 41 percent of IT workers eat out for lunch twice or more per week, making portion and calorie control difficult. Eleven percent buy their lunch out of a vending machine at least once a week."
I guess if you're a sysadmin for the Internal Revenue Service then you're really screwed.
...Mac is still skinny. He better watch out; PC may get peckish, and eat him.
Tubal-Cain smokes the white owl.
IT jobs like to hand you infinite snacks these days, there's a load of chips and such in the break room. Company culture tends to gravitate towards dubbing a measure of weight gain "The ACME Corp 20" or such nonsense, to which newbies gain some 20 pounds or so and then start limiting snack room visits.
Me, I use the stairs to get to floor 5. I have leg weights. I was in a martial arts class but a shift change took that off my plate, damn. Need to get back to the dojo. Diet? Exercise? Screw that, my entertainment and normal transportation (that is, without elevators) keeps me from being a fat ass.
Support my political activism on Patreon.
I didn't RTFA, but one thing to mention is a lot of companies these days have lots of food just laying around.
Where I work there is always a meeting with food somewhere in the building, and they always order more than they can eat. So of course as soon as the meeting is over, everyone goes and gets the leftovers. Next thing you know, you've had two lunches, two cookies and a bunch of soda you don't need.
It was the same at the last two companies I worked for and I asked a few friends and it's the same where they work.
Try some Ankle Weights. Adding just 10 lbs extra to your weight you have to carry around burns calories and adds muscle tone. If you do not have a place you can walk to from your home, a coffee place, bar or the like...find one even if you have to drive to it. Walking around a museum or city park is still walking and you might find a new friend or more. An art museum in my town costs about 50 bucks a year for a year long membership, the natural history museum is almost 150 bucks and the parks are always free.
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
Actually, I have found that just smoking more crack on the days that I eat McDonalds solves the problem~
"When life gives you lemons, don't make lemonade. Make life take the lemons back!" -- Cave Johnson
Um, hate to break this to you, but everyone already has a gravity field.
Getting more massive would indeed make that gravity field more intense.
If I have nothing to hide, don't search me
around my belly mainly.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
Never attribute this kind of stuff to your job unless other factors can be ruled out also. Lots of people without access to free snacks/pop put on weight starting about the age 25. For many, getting married seems to add a the pouch and love handles. Also, about age 25, you aren't as hyper as you were when you were 21, and so you are less anxious to run around. When I was 18-25, and in college, I ate like crap, out of vending machines and a quick pizza for lunch. Lots of un-diet sodas. I was still skinny as a rail. When I turned 25 and got married, then I started putting on weight.
Even with eating better, it still doesn't help because my activity levels are far lower than they were when I was younger.
IT and lights out management have nothing to do with it.
it's part of the stereotype. If your a fatso (me). You will be most likely to get the job. Wearing glasses helps. Evil Spock beard is better, best not to look like Pitr from User Friendly, go for Sid http://www.userfriendly.org/cartoons/sid/ but extra weight helps.
Sorry about the writing. Robot fingers, you know? Cliff Steele in DOOM PATROL #23
I'm still only 30 and my metabolism hasn't slowed down yet.
Given the other studies I see about less computer graduates, that would indicate an aging workforce.
So we have people who have been sitting in uncomfortable office chairs for 20 years writing code, eating Cheez Its or Doritos or jujubees or whatever and drinking copious quantities of caffeinated and often sugary beverages. Is it really surprising that on average they might have a couple extra pounds?
because if the food sucks, you are less likely to overeat?
I have a hunch this isn't so much a function of IT specifically but of the fact that as people get older, they tend to put on weight. The article even indicated that this wasn't just an IT issue.
"But, hey, no matter the culprits, IT workers can take heart in another CareerBuilder finding: They are less chubby than financial services and government workers. Fifty-three percent of financial workers said they have gained weight at their current jobs, while the number for government workers is 52 percent."
I actually draw a different conclusion from the article, the fact that 34% of IT professionals have gained 10+ lbs in their current profession means they've been in that profession a few years (generally you don't gain that weight overnight).
I don't know about financial workers but this hypothesis is backed up by the growth of government workers who don't change jobs a lot.
I stole this Sig
OR you could move about occasionally at work. I know that I don't *have* to sit and stare at my happy little green on black terminal all day- though I sometimes do. Little stuff like kicking your legs (Pretend that someone cares, you are alone in that dark room and you know it) can help lots. I personally have a set of 15lb dumbbells under the desk. Good for passing time, or threatening that damned mail room guy who vehemently claims that I slow down his machines on purpose. Despite his nice habit of subconsciously closing out ads as they open.
Anger in the workplace has done nothing but good for my health. Sitting there shaking in rage at the Pointy-hairs burns calories like no other! The same can be said about the ten minutes of heart pounding after I am 'surprise' visited by my uppers.
Sometimes I wish that I had a bowflex down here just to toy with them. Make them think that I actually DO have time to work out. Even better would be the questions as to how it GOT there in the first place. Piece by piece, just like I learned from MASH.
Oh, and working out. Moving around. Sex. Eat whatever you want, just move about some more to compensate!
weird hours
This is actually probably a major part of IT weight gain. I was going to the gym and working out (actually working out, not standing around watching everyone else work out) for a long time, and my weight and my pants size just kept creeping up. Went to the doctor because I figured something must be wrong, and long story short, the problem was getting home at 8-9pm, making dinner, eating dinner, and going to bed. Doc told me to take my dinner to work and eat it at 6pm every day.
In the past 5 months since I got that advice, I've lost almost 40 pounds, putting me at the lowest weight I've been since sometime in the middle of college. Can't say it's made my life great (food is so boring now, since I pretty much have to make the entire week's dinner on Sunday, by Friday dinner is just depressing, and I have to spend the weekend to figure out what dish I'll hate next week...) but I'm sure I'm healthier for it.
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
...would be to have a treadmill or cross-trainer in every cubicle. The harder the worker exercises, the higher the priority his/her processes are given.
"Hey, Joe, you're covered in sweat!"
"Yeah, I know, those KDE apps take ages to compile!"
-- In the beginning was the WORD, and the WORD was UNSIGNED, and the main(){} was without form and void...
I don't see any mention of a control group or comparison to other occupations.
Maybe 34% of all people gain 10 pounds anyway regardless of their profession or even whether or not they're employed. A lot of people gain weight over time irrespective. What phenomena is being described here?
Never mind. For anyone interested, look here and here . Both seem to be pretty reputable sources.
-Arthur
Cave ne ante ullas catapultas ambules
Eating out at work can have other benefits too.. such as escaping the office environment for some mental recovery. Complaining about the bureaucracy with co-workers can be very therapeutic. ;)
While I agree with much of what you say (I walk to lunch if I'm going out to eat, and I take the stairs all day), I've found that stress alone can actually cause me to *gain* weight. A study in a recent volume of Men's Health (can't find the link right now) also pointed to a link between high stress and weight gain.
The caveat is that for me, high stress can be the motivation I need for an extra-hard workout at the gym or an extra 2 miles on my run that day. Recently, after a manager whose job title could officially be "chief roadblock" sent me an email (CC'ing my boss) accusing me of being a "PowerPoint Engineer" (because he couldn't understand my UML diagram since he has no background in software), I hit the gym for 2 hours and took a 15 mile run in the same day. I definitely felt a lot better after that.
It's not a bug, it's a feature
You actually burn about 60 per hour.
Your body's doing a lot while sleeping. Your heart's beating, your core body temperature is maintained (this takes a reasonable amount of energy just by itself), systemic repair mechanisms are working, you're tossing and turning, etc.
occultae nullus est respectus musicae - originally a Greek proverb
Except nutrition is about balance. Of course you should eat fruits and vegetables etc, but a hamburger has nutrients too. And besides just eating nutritiously won't make you loose weight! A soda has about as many calories as fruit juice.
Win a signed Stephen Carpenter ESP Guitar from the Deftones: http://def-tag.com/?r=0008781
Funny, I thought the conversation was about nutrients, not calories. Compare soda and fruit juice based on nutrients and you should (unless you're talking about Capri Sun or Sunny-D) come to the conclusion that yes, fruit juice is better for you. And it goes without saying that "balancing" a fruit-and-vegetable diet with hamburgers is something you really shouldn't be worried about. Or just be prepared to explain why your diet needs more enriched white bread, corn syrup condiments and carcinogenically enhanced (charred) meat. :)
If you'd ever been depressed (or fat or a smoker, etc.), you know that "knowing how" and "being able to execute" are totally unrelated.
And some sort-term advise for the grandparent: Hard liquor. Fewer calories. Less filling. Better drunk/dollar value, particularly if you don't make "tastes great" a requirement.
Like I said before "eating nutritiously won't make you loose(sic) weight."
Yup. After reading a leaflet about "Five a Day" I started eating a lot of fresh fruit and vegetables and drinking lots of water at work, instead of chocolate and crisps and fizzy drinks, and I gained a lot of weight. I mean, I felt great - I had loads of energy, never felt hungry, and I looked and felt generally healthier - great. Shame about gaining about gaining so much weight.
Of course it wasn't until a couple of weeks later while we were out shopping that my girlfriend pointed out that it's meant to be five *portions* of fresh fruit and vegetables per day, not five *kilos*...