How Much Have Obesity Rates Risen Since 1950?

Although people in the United States might not be eating more, they are gaining weight. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, fat consumption by people in the United States has declined during the past decades, but calorie expenditure has gone down as well. Adults are not burning the calories they are consuming, and as a result, obesity rates increased by 214 percent between 1950 and 2000. Two out of every three people in the U.S. were obese or overweight in 2010.

1950s Statistics

From 1950 through 1960, 33 percent of U.S. adults were overweight and 9.7 percent were clinically obese, with body mass indexes above 30, according to doctor and author Jeffry Weiss. Obesity was not yet recognized as a disease in the 1950s and no statistics were gathered on extremely obese individuals with BMIs of 40 or greater.

1961 Through 1979

By the 1960s, men were consuming approximately 2,200 calories a day and woman about 1,500 calories a day. Obesity rates jumped to 11.3 percent by 1970 and an additional 3.1 percent by the end of the decade. America's eating and exercise habits began to trickle down to U.S. children, with 4 percent of children under the age of 11 registering as obese and 6.1 percent of preteens and teens considered obese by 1971.

1980 Through 1999

Through the 1980s and 1990s, obesity rates continued to climb. During the time period of 1988 through 1994, 23 percent of people in the U.S. were clinically obese and 56 percent were overweight. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention kept statistics on extremely obese individuals during this period for the first time and found that almost 3 percent of Americans had BMIs of 40 or more. Between 1991 and 1998, obesity statistics increased by 50 percent. Coincidentally, participation in high school gym classes -- once mandatory for all students -- had dropped to only 42 percent of students by 1991. Four states registered obesity prevalence rates above 15 percent that same year.

Since 2000

By 2000, 30.5 percent of Americans, almost one-third, were obese. An additional 4.7 percent were severely obese. The average U.S. adult male was eating 2,700 calories a day, up from 2,200 in the 1960s. Women increased their caloric intake to 1,950 calories per day. By 2006, not a single state reported obesity prevalence at less than 10 percent and in 23 states, obesity prevalence was over 25 percent. An estimated one out of every three children is overweight. Only about one-third of adults get proper recommended exercise and 10 percent do not exercise at all.