Category Archives: International

OECD Health Data: Americans are OECD’s Most Efficient Eaters

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Current Events 2011

It should come as no surprise to any of our readers (especially those of you who are regular viewers of Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution) that the United States has a bit of a problem with obesity. According to data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in the period 2007-2008, 33.9% of U.S. adults were obese, 5.7 % extremely obese, and an additional 34.4% of the population overweight (but not obese). These figures mark a remarkable increase since 1960, when “only” 13.4% were obese, 0.9% extremely obese, and 31.5% overweight.

The high incidence of obesity in the U.S. made us curious about how this country stacks up against other OECD countries. According to OECD’s Society at a Glance 2011, the answer is…not so well:

Note: Obesity is defined as having a body mass index (BMI) of greater than 30 kg/m2, based on height and weight.

 

As this chart shows, the obesity rate in the U.S. is twice as high as the OECD average of 17%. (Our closest competitors were New Zealand (26.5% in 2007) and Chile (25.1% in 2009). That said, a separate OECD working paper shows that the U.S. isn’t the only country that has seen “growth” in its population: the percentages of obese and overweight have been moving upward in every country and among both men and women.

While Americans clearly love to eat in terms of quantity, on average we spend far less time cooking and cleaning up per day (30 minutes, which is the lowest average in the OECD) as well as less time eating per day (74 minutes, the 3rd lowest in the OECD):

 

In this age of politicians constantly espousing American exceptionalism, when it comes to efficiency in eating (i.e., lots of food in little time), America is certainly number one.

 

The 2012 Davos World Economic Forum: What is it and why do we care?

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Davos, like Kyoto or Bretton Woods, is a location name that has become synonymous with an important world event: the Davos World Economic Forum.  With its 10th annual conference starting today, we thought we’d provide a background on this event and answer the ever-important question: why should we care?

The World Economic Forum (WEF) began in 1971 as the European Management Forum, changing its name to WEF in 1987.  WEF is a non-profit Swiss foundation based in Geneva that describes itself as “an independent international organization committed to improving the state of the world by engaging business, political, academic and other leaders of society to shape global, regional and industry agendas.” The membership, as WEF describes it, is elite: “The typical Member company is a global enterprise ranking among the top companies within their industry and/or country. Member companies play a leading role in shaping the future of their industry and/or region and, as such, are recognized among their peers and in the broader public as one of the world’s leading companies.”

WEF holds its annual conference each January in Davos, Switzerland.  This year’s theme for the conference is “The Great Transformation: Shaping New Models.”  While there are many topics that fit within this broad umbrella, one that caught our eye was the TIME Davos Debate on Capitalism (taking place earlier today), which included a call for a redesign of capitalism as a means to deal with youth unemployment. This forum, hosted by Time Magazine, featured an exchange between Sharan Burrow (General Secretary of the International Trade Union Confederation), who asserted that the system was failing because the business community “lost its moral compass,” and  David M. Rubenstein (Founder of The Carlyle Group) who argued that businesses are driven by profits and do not focus on ways to reduce wealth or jobs.  Rubenstein was supported in his rebuttal by of Bank of America who argued that in the banking industry it is understood that their power comes from their customers stating “We are big because our clients are [global] and we support them.”

One unique aspect of this year’s event is the inclusion of 70 young global shapers between the ages of 20 and 30; individuals called upon to “consider pressing issues, including the global youth unemployment crisis and the role of business in society.” There will also be another group of politically and socially active youths represented at Davos: not as part of the WEF itself, but instead outside in the Igloo Town built by Occupy protesters.

While we generally don’t promote events such as this, we feel that it’s important to follow Davos given that the ideas that come out of this event often shape world political and economic debate.  (Examples include the Global Health Initiative to counter HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria (2002), the Global Education Initiative (2003); and the Environmental Initiative (2008).

You can follow the conference and watch panels here.

Foreign Aid on the Cheap: U.S. Spending on Foreign Assistance among the Lowest in the OECD

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Since the 2010 elections, the issue that has most dominated political discourse is that of government spending. Although it is well-established that the $15 trillion and growing federal debt is primarily attributable to tax cuts (both the original 2001/2003 Bush tax cuts and the 2010 extension) and increased spending  on big-ticket items (i.e., wars in Iraq/Afghanistan, Medicare Part D, TARP, and the 2009 stimulus), politicians have given a disproportionate amount of attention to programs that consume a very small amount of the federal budget. For this article, we turn to just one of these programs—spending on foreign development aid—to better understand the trends in spending and how it fits into the rest of the federal budget.

Among the Republican candidates seeking the presidency, almost all have been on the record as being in favor of cutting foreign aid, arguing that reducing foreign aid expenditures would go a long way in helping solve our debt problems. And politicians aren’t alone: most Americans also believe these expenditures should be axed to improve our budgetary problems. But could we really balance the budget by cutting foreign aid?

The following chart looks at the trends in net spending (in current US dollars) on foreign development aid from 1960 to 2010. (To be able to make international comparisons, this chart uses figures compiled by the OECD using their own methodology; that said, USAID data show similar trends). In isolation, the chart seems to support the argument that spending on foreign aid is out of control: from 2000 to 2010, spending more than tripled from around $10 billion dollars to $30 billion dollars.

Based on aid numbers in current U.S. dollars, as reported by the OECD

Source: OECD Query Wizard for International Development Statistics (http://stats.oecd.org/qwids)

 

However, taking net foreign aid as a percentage of GDP shows a different story. The next chart shows a much smaller increase (of about 0.1 percent) in spending over the same 10-year span.

Based on aid numbers in current U.S. dollars, as reported by the OECD

Source: OECD Query Wizard for International Development Statistics (http://stats.oecd.org/qwids)

 

Finally, we wanted to look at U.S. spending compared to other developed countries. The final chart shows that US spending—at 0.21 percent of GDP—is among the lowest in the entire OECD, and far below the average of 0.49 percent across all of these countries.

 

Based on aid numbers in current U.S. dollars, as reported by the OECD

Source: OECD Query Wizard for International Development Statistics (http://stats.oecd.org/qwids)