Size discrimination creates serious economic disparity. Larger workers often face employment discrimination, experiencing fewer educational opportunities, lower hiring rates, lower wages, limited career prospects, reduced advancement opportunities and promotions, unequal treatment, harassment, lost productivity, decreased job satisfaction, reduced health benefits, and more, leading to economic disparities. 93% of employers would hire a thin employee over a higher-weight employee with the same qualifications. Higher-weight women earn $9,000 less annually than their smaller peers.

Despite the Affordable Care Act claiming “obesity” as a pre-existing condition, 26% of fat individuals were denied health insurance at work due to their weight status. 24% of nurses say they are “repulsed” by higher-weight people; over 50% of doctors find fat patients “awkward, ugly, weak-willed, and unlikely to comply with treatment.” Furthermore, 61% of fat adults report receiving inappropriate comments about their weight from doctors in emergency situations. The fear of stigma and discrimination may deter individuals from seeking necessary healthcare, leading to delayed diagnoses and inadequate treatment. Weight normativity conflates thinness with health, and further conflates health with moral virtue. It assumes that there is a universal standard of health, and that it is within reach of every individual, regardless of chronic conditions, health goals, eating habits, activity level, physical limitations, sleep habits, cultural norms, access to food, or financial considerations. Fat individuals with mobility impairments or chronic illnesses may face blame for their conditions due to their weight. Further, conditions unrelated to weight may be missed or ignored, as fat individuals are often encouraged or pressured to lose weight while being denied specialist visits, imaging, medications, surgeries, or other treatment. These views also ignore the fundamental fact that all individuals are worthy and deserving of healthcare, whether they are “healthy” or not. Health status should never be used to judge, oppress, or determine the value of an individual.

Weight normativity contributes to the marginalization of individuals with diverse body types, leading to body dissatisfaction, self-image concerns, disembodiment, hypervigilance, and loss of safety. Weight and height discrimination lead to social exclusion, body shaming, and bullying, depriving people of a sense of belonging and community support. The cumulative effects of weight-based stigma are shown to increase mortality and decrease life span. Stress caused by discrimination and weight-based identity threat may contribute to the development of chronic conditions such as hypertension, diabetes, and cardiovascular diseases. Moreover, weight-based discrimination has been shown to increase the incidence of all types of eating disorders. Disordered eating is one of the deadliest mental illnesses, second only to opioid overdose. 9% of the US population will have an eating disorder in their lifetime, and 26% of those afflicted will attempt suicide. In 2023, 70% of EDF’s community members struggling with eating disorders reported that the quality of their mental health treatment was negatively impacted because of weight-based measures, causing denial of care or early termination of care; another 15% reported that weight-based shame or stigma prevented them from seeking treatment at all.

Weight stigma is rooted in and inextricable from racism, anti-Blackness, and anti-Indigeneity. Communities of Color are disproportionately impacted by all aspects of size discrimination. Like height, the percentage of higher weight people differs by race/ethnicity, thus body size discrimination can create a legal loophole that masks otherwise illegal race/ethnicity discrimination. By failing to address weight and height discrimination, we fail to serve Colorado’s BIPOC communities.