How Your Job Makes It Harder to Lose Weight

If you get up in the morning and work out for an hour, you’ve earned the right to “veg out” for the rest of the day. Not true. Structured exercise you do at the gym only accounts for a small percentage of the calories you burn during the day. That’s why it’s important to keep moving even when you’re not working out.

People who work highly active jobs have more opportunity to move around and burn calories than people who sit behind a computer monitor all day. That works in their favor when it comes to weight control and overall health. Recent studies show that prolonged sitting increases mortality regardless of whether you work out at the gym for an hour a day. Have you ever wondered how many calories you burn on the job and how it affects your health?

Occupational Calorie Burn: Do You Burn A Lot of Calories on the Job?

If you have a job that keeps you on your feet and active during the day, you’ll burn significantly more calories than someone who works a desk job. People who work in the forestry industry can burn 600 to 1,000 calories per hour, making it one of the most active jobs. Other highly active professions are firefighting, farming, professional moving, carpentry work, welding work, landscaping, and roofing. People in these professions burn 180 to 450 calories per hour depending upon the intensity of the job.

Contrast that with people who work a desk job. According to Calorielab.com, light office work and sitting in meetings only burns around 34 calories per hour. Unless you get up and move around, you’re burning 272 calories over the course of an 8-hour day. Compare that to farmers who burn as many as 1,600 calories during an 8-hour work day. The farmer burned more calories during work hours than an office worker who stopped by the gym before work. Plus, farmers don’t sit for long periods of time, a known risk factor for health problems.

Occupational Calorie Burn is Important

As you can see, if you have a desk job, it’s important to stay active. According to the American Cancer Society, sitting for more than 6 hours a day raises the risk of heart disease and type 2 diabetes and boosts overall mortality by 40%. That’s a pretty good reason to get moving, isn’t it? If you have a job where you sit much of the day, here are some ways to stay more active.

Set an alarm as a reminder to get up and walk around every 20 or 30 minutes at work. Walk around the building, and go up and down the stairs. If you can’t leave your office, at least get out of your chair and stretch every 20 minutes.

Walk during your lunch hour. Pack a healthy, bagged lunch that you can eat on the go. Take a brisk walk during lunch instead of sitting in the lunch room. Use break time to take a brisk walk. It’ll help you avoid the inevitable doughnuts and cookies in the break room.

Stay active when you’re talking on the phone by pacing around the office. That’s an advantage of cell phones – they keep you mobile. Return phone calls when you walk, not when you’re sitting in a chair.

Sit on a balance ball instead of a chair to engage your core muscles more during the day or put a portable pedal machine underneath your desk so you can pedal while you work.

Wear a pedometer to motivate yourself to move more during the day.

The Bottom Line?

Having a desk job is a risk factor for weight gain and other health problems. Find ways to move more on the job, and don’t assume you can take it easy just because you work out at the gym.

References:

Calorie Lab. “Calories Burned Search Results for Occupation”
American Cancer Society. “How to Ruin My Day: New Research Shows That How Much You Sit Counts More Than How Much You Exercise”

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How Desk Jobs Make It Harder to Lose Weight and How to Avoid the Pitfalls