New research shows poverty is fattening for women

The past seven years have been rough for Michelle Miller. After splitting with her husband, the mother of two struggled to keep a job, had to move in with her parents and gained 100 pounds.

Miller, who brings in about $1,000 a month managing a recording artist, correlates her expanding waistline with her shrinking budget. And, MSN Money reports, research backs her up.

Americans across all income levels are getting fatter, according a 2010 Centers for Disease Control study of socioeconomic status and obesity. The number of obese people in the United States doubled between 1980 and 2000. Among men, obesity rates are similar regardless of money. Among women, though, the rich tend to be thinner. Forty-two percent of women with incomes flirting with the federal poverty line are obese, compared to 29 percent of wealthier women.

Adam Drewnowski, director of the Center for Obesity Research at the University of Washington, claims he can gauge the income level of a lecture audience by taking note of the number of obese women in the room.

"If one third of my audience is obese, I don't think 'These are people with weak willpower or who made bad choices,'" he told MSN Money. "I say, 'These are women who do not make more than $40,000 a year."

Wealthy neighborhoods in Seattle boast obesity rates as low as 6 percent while, in poor areas, obesity is closer to 30 percent, according to Drewnowski's research.

A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine in October further concluded the opportunity to move from a high-poverty neighborhood to a low-poverty neighborhood was associated with "modest but potentially important" reductions in the prevalence of extreme obesity. Switching neighborhoods had a similar effect to best-practice lifestyle interventions and medication use.

For that study, sponsored by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, 4,500 women were divided into three groups. One group was given a rent-subsidy voucher that could only be used in neighborhoods with a low poverty rate. Another was given an unrestricted rent-subsidy voucher. The third did not receive a rent-subsidy voucher. When researchers followed up with the women 10 and 15 years later, those who were required to move to low-poverty neighborhoods showed a reduction in the risk of extreme obesity and diabetes.