Facts & Figures

from the
Council on Size & Weight Discrimination

The average American woman is 5'4", weighs 140 lbs., and wears a size 14 dress.

The “ideal” woman—portrayed by models, Miss America, Barbie dolls, and screen actresses—is 5'7", weighs 100 lbs., and wears a size 8.

One-third of all American women wear a size 16 or larger.

75% of American women are dissatisfied with their appearance.

50% of American women are on a diet at any one time.

Between 90% and 99% of reducing diets fail to produce permanent weight loss.

Two-thirds of dieters regain the weight within one year. Virtually all regain it within five years.

The diet industry (diet foods, diet programs, diet drugs, etc.) takes in over $40 billion each year, and is still growing.

Quick-weight-loss schemes are among the most common consumer frauds, and diet programs have the highest customer dissatisfaction of any service industry.

Young girls are more afraid of becoming fat than they are of nuclear war, cancer, or losing their parents.

50% of 9-year-old girls and 80% of 10-year-old girls have dieted.

90% of high school junior and senior women diet regularly, even though only between 10% and 15% are over the weight recommended by the standard height-weight charts.

1% of teenage girls and 5% of college-age women become anorexic or bulimic.

Anorexia has the highest mortality rate (up to 20%) of any psychiatric diagnosis.

Girls develop eating and self-image problems before drug or alcohol problems; there are drug and alcohol programs in almost every school, but no eating disorder programs.

Copyright 1996 Council on Size & Weight Discrimination, Inc.
P.O. Box 305
Mt. Marion, NY 12456
(914) 679-1209
Copying permitted (with copyright intact).

(Note from Peggy Elam: The most recent figure I heard on the annual worth of the diet/weight loss industry—in 2000—was $100 billion. Since that time, the number of weight loss surgeries has been increasing yearly.)