By Ishaan Musunuri
Introduction
Over the last 60 years, American obesity rates have been increasing drastically. According to academicearth.org, “The adult obesity rate in the U.S. increased by 214 percent between 1950 and 2000, in large part due to the extraordinary economic, technological, and cultural shifts rippling through America in the wake of World War II”. According to the CDC, about 41.9% of Americans are obese in March 2017-2020.
Obesity also affects some groups more than others. The chart below shows obesity rates of different races in Americans with data from the CDC. America's health was affected negatively because of changes in American lifestyle, with the decline of farming and increase of suburban neighborhoods, and dietary changes, such as an inclusion of snack foods or other quick, easily accessible foods into the American diet.
Lifestyle Change
Some of the more significant changes that came to America after World War 2, were the various lifestyle changes . First, there was a large decrease in farming families and farms in general. According to Jayson Lusk, the number of farms decreased from 7 million to about 2 million from 1940 to 2007. This decline in farming led to fresh produce being less and less available for people. Families that lived on farms also lost their livelihood.
In 1965, an article named LOOK ran a story titled "Growing Up on a Farm, the Vanishing Life." A photographer, named Archie Liberman, followed a farmer, Bill Hammer Sr. and his family in Scales Mound, Illinois for 10 years prior to the article being published and for 30 years after. Harmer Sr was asked about the sustainability of the farming profession and if his son Bill Jr. would be able to stay in the field. His response was :"For Bill, [Jr.,] there is no better life than a farmer's life, but whether he can remain on the farm is problematical. Thirty years ago, there were about 7 million farms. Today fewer than 3.5 million farms feed 53 percent more people. By 1980, experts say, there may be only a million farms left.” Fortunately, Bill Jr. and his son Jim were able to work on a farm for a living. However this wasn't the case for many farmers. During the Great Depression alone 750,000 farmers lost their farms and by 1980 there were only 2.5 million farms.
Consequently, another dramatic change in American lifestyle was the introduction of suburban neighborhoods. After WWII, there was a boom in the American economy with a hungry consumer fueling it, and a baby boom. According to academicearth.org, “Between 1940 and 1950, the country’s GDP rose from $100 billion to $288 billion. By 1960, it had reached $515 billion; Americans were experiencing the largest expansion in the nation’s history” One development of this newfound wealth were suburban neighborhoods. A new suburban lifestyle, the modern age of food, and the general sedentary nature of modern lifestyle come to life. The suburban neighborhoods were close to work and were designed to drive through, not walk through, which significantly reduced the physical activity people had to do on a daily basis. Supermarkets started to stock convenient, high-calorie foods and food production started to become centralized at large factories instead of being sourced locally. This lifestyle was also being promoted throughout America. Lizzie Collingham wrote a book named "The Taste of War," and in it, she mentioned how Americans wanted to enjoy the spoils of winning a war. Cunningham wrote, “What most Americans wanted was their own home.” (Cunningham), because of the overpopulation of large cities
Dietary Change
Another significant change that occurred after WW2 was the change in American’s diet. First, there was a significant increase in the use of herbicides and pesticides. Prior to World War II, farmers used organic practices and a few inorganic pesticides to control harmful pests. However, according to a study done by the United States Department of Agriculture, there has been a significant increase of new synthetic, organic materials such as the insecticide DDT and the herbicide 2,4-D since World War II ended. WWII left the government with a large quantity of unused ammonium nitrate and poison gases. According to academicearth.org “These chemicals were a pivotal part of creating a huge food surplus and a market for cheap, high-calorie foods—especially anything with corn.” This made crop production more efficient and provided crop protection. Pesticide use helped reduce the price of crops significantly as there were much more crops being planted. In that same study, the USDA “Average corn yields rose from 20 bushels per acre in 1930 to more than 150 bushels per acre in recent years. During the same period, cotton yields rose nearly fourfold, and soybean yields increased more than threefold” However, these new pesticides and herbicides had a lot of negative impacts on people’s health. In addition to having harmful chemicals, pesticides and herbicides had other negative effects on American health. Because pesticides led to more and more food being produced people ate more food. These chemicals played a huge part in creating a market for cheap, high-calorie foods—especially anything with corn. For example, academicearth.org presented an example, “Consider the potato chip: in 1945 per capita consumption was at 1.91 pounds, in 1955 it was at 2.56 pounds of chips.” This shows that the American standard amount of food increased throughout the years. This overconsumption of food continued throughout the 20th century into the 21st century which has likely played a part in the nation’s abundance of health problems. Moreover, another change in the American diet was the introduction of high fructose corn syrup, snack foods, and other processed unhealthy foods. TV shows and advertisements began promoting unhealthy, convenient foods such as chips, popcorn , pork rinds, etc., and soon supermarkets were stocked with foods that were sugary, fried, or salty. Additionally, according to academicearth.org, “these ads weren’t simply selling junk food. They were marketing the entire suburban way of life.” Americans had become overexposed to this convenient junk food, and the obesity epidemic started to take control.
Another reason for the American change in diet was because of food rations during the war. During the war, all foods from butter, sugar, meat and milk were rationed. According to Dan Woeller, there were many new snack foods that started popping up, such as Twinkies, White Castle’s mini-egg sandwiches, french fries, and peanut butter sandwiches. Foods such as peanut butter was something that was eaten by soldiers as it was never rationed and was popularized when it was brought back. Woeller said that “Peanut Butter was a good source of protein that was never rationed during the War” (Woeller). Another new invention that came after the war was high fructose corn syrup, which rose to popularity during the 70s. John S.White did a study trying to find a link between obesity and high fructose corn syrup consumption. He mentions clearly that “HFCS is not sweeter than sucrose” (sucrose is the sugar used in sweeteners). This meant that in order to reach the same amount of sweetness that one would get when using sugar, companies would have to put excessive amounts of high fructose syrup in order to match the level of sweetness.
Conclusion: In conclusion, America’s health as a nation has been deteriorating since World War 2 due to lifestyle changes such as a reduction in farming, and suburban neighborhoods, and the introduction of unhealthy processed snack foods, and high fructose corn syrup into the diet. However, there are many ways for one to combat this. It’s important to limit eating out as much as possible, buying and eating a healthy serving of fruits and vegetables. Try to do at least 30 mins of exercise a day; this can be as simple as walking around the block. If you aren’t able to access healthy fruits and vegetables, one way you can get access to them is through at-home gardening. There are many leafy greens and other plants that are easy to grow even in a pot inside your home; for example, tomatoes grow really quickly during the spring and summertime and are used in many different dishes.
References
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“How the End of World War II Made Us Fat.” Academic Earth, AcademicEarth.org, a Red Ventures Company, 4 Nov. 2022, https://academicearth.org/electives/how-the-end-of-world-war-ii-made-us-fat/.
Ganzel, Bill. “Farming in the 1950s and 60s.” livinghistoryfarm, 2007, https://livinghistoryfarm.org/farminginthe50s/farminginthe1950s.html.
White JS. Straight talk about high-fructose corn syrup: what it is and what it ain't. Am J Clin Nutr. 2008 Dec;88(6):1716S-1721S. doi: 10.3945/ajcn.2008.25825B. PMID: 19064536.
“High-Fructose Corn Syrup or Table Sugar: For Better Health, Avoid Too Much of Either.” News, 9 Jan. 2014, https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/hsph-in-the-news/high-fructose-corn-syrup-or-tablesugar-for-better-health-avoid-too-much-of-either/#:~:text=2022%20Multimedia-,High%2D fructose%20corn%20syrup%20or%20table%20sugar%3A%20For%20better%20health, Health%20nutrition%20expert%20Frank%20Hu.
Collingham, Lizzie, and Madeleine Crum. “How World War II Changed the Way Americans Ate.” HuffPost, HuffPost, 3 Apr. 2012, https://www.huffpost.com/entry/wwii-food-america_n_1398132.
Lusk, Jayson. “The Evolution of American Agriculture.” Jayson Lusk, Jayson Lusk, 27 June 2016, http://jaysonlusk.com/blog/2016/6/26/the-evolution-of-american-agriculture
