How much is an hour of exercise worth in 2023?
By evaluating the costs the average American spends treating several common diseases each year, the effects of which can also be somewhat mitigated by regular physical exertion, we’ve concluded that an hour of exercise is worth $75.41 in 2023.
If you’ve read many of my posts, you probably know that I like to run.
There are a lot of questions that bobble around in your head while on a run, but one seems to be especially relevant:
Is this worth it?
Honestly, I enjoy running, so I never asked this question to myself as if I was looking for a justification to quit, but I have wondered what the monetary benefit is.
We make a lot of decisions based on whether or not the benefit is worth exchanging the time trade-off. Why would exercise be any different?
What follows is a fun effort to place a monetary value on an hour of cardiovascular exercise.
How often should I be exercising?
According to the CDC, adults should aim for at least 150 minutes of physical activity per week.
That may seem like a lot, but it’s less than 1.5% of your available time in a seven-day period.
If you spread that out to 30 minutes a day, you even get two days off.
From what I’ve read, the level of intensity is really up to you. So long as you’re on your feet and moving around, anything from a steady walk to wind sprints does a body good.
The CDC also recommends muscle training at least 2 days a week to keep your body strong.
It’s at this point I’ll go ahead and let you know that we won’t be factoring weight training into this analysis and will only focus on cardiovascular exercise instead.
It’s not because weight training isn’t good for you. It obviously is. And you may even be able to turn a weightlifting session into a solid cardiovascular workout.
We’re focusing on cardio only because that’s where most of the research is. Since I’m not a physician or kinesiologist, I’m only summarizing the research of others and converting it into a fun and entertaining formula.
Let me repeat that for those of you in the back of the room. This is a “fun” post. I hope it provokes thought too, but I’m not a doctor and nothing in this write-up should be considered medical advice. Go see a doctor if you want input about your health.
Oh, and consult with your physician before beginning an exercise regimen or diet.
What are the benefits of exercise?
The primary medical benefits of cardiovascular exercise we’ll examine today are 1) cardiovascular health, 2) defense against diabetes, and 3) healthy body weight.
Even though there are a lot of other benefits to exercise, I’m focusing on these three.
Heart disease and diabetes are the two most expensive medical conditions in the United States. Combined, they accounted for more than $369 billion in medical expenses in 2020 in our wonderfully sedentary country.
Obesity comes in at #5 behind cancer and dementia but still accounts for $147 billion by itself.
I know we can’t eliminate these three diseases/infirmities completely, but that’s over one-half trillion dollars of illness over which we actually have some control and hope of improving. Seems like a worthwhile endeavor to me.
How much is the health benefit worth?
Let’s start by figuring out how we’re going to assign a health value to every individual.
Since we know that the three ailments we’re covering today accounted for $516 billion dollars in medical expenses in 2020, let’s inflate that to 2023 dollars.
I paid a quick visit to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ CPI Inflation Calculator and found that $517 billion in March 2020 is now valued at $599.23 billion in January 2023.
According to census.gov’s population clock, there were 334,414,390 Americans on February 22, 2023, including adults and children.
Therefore, we can easily calculate that each American would account for $1,791.88 of the annual cost associated with these three diseases.
Well, they would if every American had heart disease, diabetes, or was dealing with obesity.
But, not everyone has heart disease, diabetes, or obesity.
The costs for those ailments should be calculated based on the number of people who actually struggle with the given illness because there are already many people out there exercising who keep the total cost lower than it could be.
As unhealthy as we are, can you imagine how expensive this would all be if no one exercised?
Also, all the exercise in the world won’t guarantee that you’ll avoid heart disease and diabetes completely (though I suppose there is a pretty direct correlation with obesity).
We need to weigh the amount of savings produced by exercise according to its relative effectiveness in preventing each disease.
Let’s evaluate the costs and potential savings on a case-by-case basis.
Heart Disease
We’ve already established that heart disease accounted for $193 billion in annual direct medical expenses in the United States prior to March 2020.
In today’s dollars, that’s $223.7 billion.
Depending on who you ask, anywhere from 20 million to 150 million Americans struggle with heart disease.
I’m going to stick with the CDC here and their June 2022 statistic that shows approximately 20.1 million Americans have coronary artery disease (a.k.a. CAD). That’s 6.04% of the population.
So, if we divide up the $223.7 billion that will be spent treating heart disease in 2023, each of these 20.1 million people will average an expense of $11,129.35 annually.
We’ve also established that exercise may not be totally perfect at preventing heart disease. Even though it’s certainly helpful, some people will develop heart disease despite their best physical efforts to prevent it.
My search for a study that pinpointed an effective percentage came up empty, but I did find a 2018 study from Stanford University that showed individuals with a genetic disposition toward heart disease were 49% less likely to develop the illness if they exercised regularly.
Good enough for me.
So, if we take the $11,129.35 in expenses that each person with heart disease is responsible for, $5,453.38 of it should be preventable annually with exercise.
Hang in there, we’re almost done.
If we assume everyone is good and exercises 150 minutes each week, that’s 7,800 minutes or 130 hours of exercise each year (150 x 52/60).
Dividing 130 into our annual exercisibly eliminatable total of $5,398.78, we arrive at the conclusion that one hour of exercise is worth $41.95 of heart disease protection.
Whew. On to…
Diabetes
I’m going to use the same logic we’ve used before but will consolidate things a bit for these next two evaluations.
Diabetes accounted for $201.95 billion in medical expenses in 2022 according to the National Association of Biomedical Research study we’ve already referenced.
According to our friends at the CDC, 37.3 million Americans have diabetes.
That’s $5,414.21 of annual expenses for each person afflicted with diabetes.
According to a study by the National Institutes of Health, exercise and a low-fat diet reduced the risk of developing diabetes by 58%.
58% of $5,14.21 is $3,140.24.
If we exercise 130 hours each year, then each hour is worth $24.16 for diabetes prevention.
Obesity
Obesity accounted for $168.67 billion in medical expenses in 2022.
Sticking with the CDC, 41.9% or 139,544,236 Americans are considered “obese”. I didn’t dig through the study for very long, but I did not see an explanation of how they defined “obese”.
In any event, this obesity rate means that each obese person accounts for $1,208.72 of medical costs annually.
Unlike heart disease and diabetes, we are going to give exercise a 100% effective rate at treating obesity.
Though I’m sure there may be a few exceptions to the rule, generally speaking, anyone will lose weight if they exercise more and eat the same amount.
Dividing $1,208.72 of individual annual costs by 130 hours of exercise gives a total of $9.30 of obesity-preventing value per hour of exercise.
Summary:
If we add the totals for the impact of exercise against cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and obesity, we arrive at a final value of $75.41 per hour of exercise.
That’s good work if you can get it.
In all seriousness, I’m actually pretty surprised by this. I know our approach was semi-scientific at best, but as a back-of-the-napkin number I’d say we did okay.
After all, there’s not much point in spending your life trying to build net worth if you’re too unhealthy to enjoy it.
A few other thoughts:
1) If you have medical insurance, and I hope you do, much of this cost would likely be borne by your insurance company or Medicare and not you. However, the effect of that expense is spread out to other policyholders and/or taxpayers, so it’s not like it’s free.
2) We only evaluated 3 of the 5 most expensive diseases in the United States. Studies also show that exercise improves aspects of mental, reproductive, sleeping, muscular, and social health in addition to benefits in preventing some cancers. The benefit could well exceed the amount we’ve arrived at here.
So, there you have it. The next time you’re struggling through a particularly difficult workout and asking yourself whether or not it’s worth it, you’ll know you’re creating a rough value of $75 by seeing it through.
