MedEcon: Obese workers' pay lower due to health costs?

Sparkgrass ConservaBuddy Bo Cowgill found an interesting study from his alma mater:

Studies have consistently shown that obese employees are paid less than normal-weight employees doing similar jobs, leading many people to attribute the gap to prejudice against workers based on their appearance.

But new research from Stanford University health economists adds another wrinkle to understanding these pay differentials: obese workers are paid less only when they have employer-sponsored health insurance.

To clear up the logical first question that may pop into your mind,

"We don't think this is a conscious process where the employer says, 'OK, Jane is obese, and we're paying for her health coverage, so let's pay her this much less in wages,'" Bundorf said. But she added that the finding that the pay for obese insured workers rises more slowly than that of their normal-weight counterparts suggests that obese workers may be getting smaller and less frequent raises.

Aside from providing insight into the costs of obesity among workers, the study provides perhaps the strongest evidence to date that the costs of employer-sponsored health insurance are, in fact, passed on to workers through lower wages. By implication, insured workers should be just as alarmed by rising health-care costs as their employers are.

Of course, the interpretation of such a study, i.e. what actions such information should summon, can be spun various ways. I believe that such a study should show employers that they should be vested in preventative health measures for their employees as a way of reducing overall cost. I'm sure the Bill O'Reilly's of the world will say the fat people should 1) get off their fat asses, and 2) have to pay more. Option A (preventative measures) actually addresses the problem, whereas Option B (watching the O'Reilly Factor) ignores it in hopes that the fat people will die and go away.

I think it might be premature to completely disregard the idea that actual discrimination has a part in lower wages for the obese. Of course, this study doesn't make any such claim, noting a discrepancy in raises between obese and non-obese workers which could very well be attributed, at least in part, to discrimination and/or decreased productivity due to complications of obesity.