Althouse: "Estimated percentage of U.S. female CEOs who are overweight : 10... Of U.S. male CEOs : 65."

May 17, 2014

"Estimated percentage of U.S. female CEOs who are overweight : 10... Of U.S. male CEOs : 65."

The last 2 items on this month's Harper's Index. (You might need a subscription to get there.)

What does that gender disparity mean?

Is it that a particular type of woman makes it to the top whereas a more general, closer-to-average sort of man does? Is it that the category of male CEOs is just much larger, and statistics tend toward the average as the group gets larger?

Or is it something more like what I think the Harper's Indexers are trying to put into your head: The standards are different for women, and women are expected to look better while men's deficiencies are overlooked?

Or is it that women are getting a boost because of their looks and men get to the top more on job-related merit?

Or perhaps leadership and work stress affect female and male bodies differently, so that females bodies reduce fat but males bodies add it....

24 comments:

Hagar said...: Women compete against each other more than with men.; 5/17/14, 8:12 AM
Sydney said...: ...women are expected to look better while men's deficiencies are overlooked?

Or is it that women are getting a boost because of their looks

The two are not mutually exclusive. In general, people have trouble looking past a woman's appearance. It also seems that men can carry more weight before they are perceived as fat than women can. Fat women are generally disrespected. Slim women are given a baseline of respect that they may not deserve.

I have no hard proof of this, just my own experience. When I am at my heaviest, I have trouble getting people to take me seriously. When I lose weight, they are much nicer and respectful to me.

The sex disparity in weight perception is something I have noticed with my patients. When I send them to a specialist- especially a surgeon or an orthopedist - that specialist is more likely to blame their problems on being overweight if they are a woman than if they are a man, even when their BMIs are similar. They are also more likely to include in their description "obese white female" than "obese white male."; 5/17/14, 8:32 AM
Fritz said...: When biology and behavior are concerned "all of the above" should always be considered before any single option.; 5/17/14, 8:40 AM
Ann Althouse said...: I thought of another thing: Men in business wear suits that are effective in disguising a fair amount of weight. In a workplace where suits are the norm for men, weight shows more on the women, so they get more of the prejudice against fat.; 5/17/14, 8:48 AM
Ann Althouse said...: Also, men may be more honest in reporting fat. (How was the research done?)

And if overweight is determined by BMI, many men are classified as overweight when they're just muscular. Maybe CEO males are very muscular.; 5/17/14, 8:49 AM
Quaestor said...: Also, men may be more honest in reporting fat. (How was the research done?)

Damned straight. Before trying place some kind of socio-economic or anthropological interpretation on this we should ask whether Harper's Index is at all trustworthy.

Given the track record of what passes for science in the public interest in this country, the latest epic fail being the revelation that the dietary fat heart correlation is appalling rubbish, particularly in light of the untold billions of dollars wasted tilting at that windmill.; 5/17/14, 9:11 AM
Michael said...: It means that many men at the top spend 16 hours at the office and none at the gym. They work on weekends. If they exercise at all it is swinging golf clubs at balls driven to in carts.

Women can spend whatever time they like trying to concoct rationales why they lag in business but as their audience buys in to these "narrativs" they drift further back in the pack. Satisfied, I suppose, with what they believe to be good excuses.; 5/17/14, 9:17 AM
Left Bank of the Charles said...: Bullshit. Let's see the list behind this study. It can't be long, as there are only 22 women CEOs of Fortune 500 companies.; 5/17/14, 9:20 AM
Quaestor said...: This kind of survey-based research, the bread and butter of sociology since Adam, is mostly crap, yet it continues to plague and confuse us.

As a professor of statistics once told me in all sincerity, there are lies, damned lies, and statistics. The fact that the editors of Harper's Index would even pretend to gather statistics on CEO obesity as a function of sex says more about the editors of Harper's Index than it does about fat bosses.; 5/17/14, 9:29 AM
Quaestor said...: "the dietary fat heart correlation" should read "the dietary fat / heart disease correlation"

Another epic fail.; 5/17/14, 9:32 AM
David said...: Estimated by whom?

The world is full of bullshit statistics. No proof that this is not one of them.; 5/17/14, 9:59 AM
Quaestor said...: "Given the track record of what passes for science in the public interest in this country, the latest epic fail being the revelation that the dietary fat heart correlation is appalling rubbish, particularly in light of the untold billions of dollars wasted tilting at that windmill."

Somehow in the cut/paste operation the second half of that long sentence vanished into the aether. The missing stuff which completes the above monstrosity amounts to this: Examine any claim derived from survey-based research with a notably unblinking gimlet eye.; 5/17/14, 10:05 AM
David said...: Let's look at secretaries of state since Bill Clinton's administration.

Madeline Albright
Hillary Clinton
Condi Rice
John Kerry
Colin Powell
Warren Christopher; 5/17/14, 10:06 AM
madAsHell said...: Nobody likes bossy, fat chicks.; 5/17/14, 10:07 AM
Quaestor said...: I'm blaming my new Kindle Fire HD. Think I'll get away with it?; 5/17/14, 10:09 AM
Bruce Hayden said...: Let me suggest that part of it (assuming that it is true) is the same reason that men tend to make a little more money than women with the same entering qualifications - they work longer hours for a longer period of time. When you are on the plane a couple times a week, and working 80 hour weeks, keeping up at the gym is hard, and there is a tendency to eat hotel food and the like. In a recent job, I traveled a bit, and found after I left that it took a year or two to get back onto my weight. Now, I try for at least an hour of moderate exercise a day, something that I found I had given up in that job. But, when you are in that mode, it is one of the things that you can dispose of to make things work. I also found that I wasn't watching what I ate - eating more for expediency than for health.

Another thing though may be a difference in the way that the two sexes handle stress. This is completely conjecture, and so could be way off. But, the women I know who have found themselves stressed seem to lose weight, not gain it. At least if they are working. One told me that she just forgot to eat. Guys though seem to eat ambivalently, which has the opposite effect. I, for one, tend to gain weight under stress, and lose it when I get out from under the stress.; 5/17/14, 10:52 AM
RigelDog said...: Hi SES women are thin and IMO this pressure is a peer-pressure more than general societal pressure.; 5/17/14, 12:08 PM
readering said...: I wondeer if womeen CEOs have fewer children than most women, which makes their body types unusual. Also go with the suit thing.; 5/17/14, 12:11 PM
The Crack Emcee said...: The standards women (neurotically) put on themselves are different from men, who - if they are men - generally don't give a damn and resent society's efforts to make us. Go - stare at the mirror or your latest charm:

I've got other things to do,...; 5/17/14, 12:11 PM
readering said...: I wondeer if womeen CEOs have fewer children than most women, which makes their body types unusual. Also go with the suit thing.; 5/17/14, 12:11 PM
casey said...: " It also seems that men can carry more weight before they are perceived as fat than women can. "

Sydney nails it. These guys are fat according to the charts, but they don't look fat nowadays.; 5/17/14, 12:44 PM
The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...: Fat women, even in positions of power (actually, especially in positions of power) seldom command sincere respect. It's an attitude we're conditioned to from childhood.; 5/17/14, 10:59 PM
Achilles said...: When I started running the current companies I am building and operating getting to the gym is a luxury I haven't had time for. I have always been borderline obese measured by BMI. I actually lose weight when I don't get to the gym. I have a good metabolism that allows me some leeway but if my brother lived like I do he would be obese.; 5/18/14, 2:10 AM
stlcdr said...: Ackbar says: "It's a trap!"; 5/18/14, 5:14 AM