HealthyWage Pays to Lose Weight
 

HealthyWage™ (www.HealthyWage.com), offers Americans the opportunity to earn money losing weight through any diet and/or fitness program they choose to follow (Weight Watchers®, Jenny Craig®, Nutrisystem®, Atkins®, or any other formal or informal diet/fitness regimen). Health and wellness purveyor HealthyWage provides cash incentives, social and expert-based support, tools and resources, and goal-setting and tracking technologies to address our nation’s obesity epidemic and improve America’s collective health.

HealthyWage is founded on research that proves cash rewards triple the effectiveness of weight loss programs. “Studies show that monetary incentives serve to enhance the effectiveness of, and duly complement, weight-loss programs of any and all sorts, especially when paid out quickly like our various programs,” said HealthyWage co-founder David Roddenberry. “In fact, in 2011 our membership base grew more than 500% over the year prior, with program participants collectively losing more than 880,000 pounds and banking nearly half a million dollars cash for their effort in kind. These results exemplify why financial health incentives are a growing trend, with more than 50% of self-insured employers in the U.S now offering some type of financial inducement as part of their healthcare program.”

HealthyWage currently offers three distinct cash rewards-based diet programs that pay participants to successfully make healthy choices. The company’s pioneering BMI Challenge pays $1,000 to those who invest $300 to participate and move from an obese BMI classification (greater than 30) to a normal BMI (less than 25) over a year’s time, while following a few rules and checking in on a weekly basis. For those who prefer to participate in the BMI Challenge for free, without any up-front investment, HealthyWage offers the option to earn $100 for achieving these same term-based BMI goals. To date, approximately 25% of individuals who committed their own money have won the cash prize and achieved a healthy weight through this particular program. In fact, the company determined that participants who put their own money at risk are more than 10-times more likely to win the BMI Challenge.

HealthyWage also offers “Matchup” competitions – team weight-loss contests that reward top-performing teams with a total of $18,000 in cash prizes. Throughout each Matchup teams of 5 compete for the greatest percentage of weight lost over a 3-month period. Each participant pays a $60 registration fee and weighs in at the beginning and end of the contest at a local health club. The rules discourage unhealthful tactics by limiting the 12-week weight loss to 16.7 percent of body weight and one-week losses to 1.5 percent.

In addition to those participating at an individual level, large employers also join the Matchups in a “Company vs. Company” division where they compete against other organizations to have their employees lose the greatest percentage weight. Participants in HealthyWage Matchup contests have realized notable results, with median weight loss of 4.6 percent and more than 40 percent of participants losing over five percent of their body weight — a clinically significant amount associated with improved health and lowered health care costs.

HealthyWage’s “10% Challenge” program allows health-seekers nationwide to “bet” – and profit – on shedding their unwanted pounds. Through this program, participants pay $100 for an opportunity to double their money and earn $200 for losing just 10% of their starting body weight, BMI aside, within 6-months. Each participant’s starting and ending weights are verified at one of thousands of HealthyWage health club partners throughout the U.S., with each member also self-reporting their weight online once per week.

HealthyWage is at the forefront of the health incentives trend – efforts the company hopes will counter costly alternatives overweight and obese individuals will face up ahead. This includes the recent health care Bill Affordable Care Act (Section 2705) stipulating that, starting in 2014, employers can use measures such as BMI to adjust health insurance premiums based on outcome-based wellness incentives by up to 30% – up from the current 20% level. In addition, Arizona recently proposed charging obese residents on Medicaid $50 as a financial penalty for being overweight. The proposition is currently under review, with similar consideration being given in other states.

Those interested in learning more may do so online at www.HealthyWage.com.