Looking at obese people in a compartmental fashion, does not go far enough. It’s the same evolutionary developed, neurochemical stimuli that drives people to overeat, that drives people to be wealthy – that is driving the world wide domino defaults. It just manifest in differently throughout society.
One way you could look at these evolutionary developed triggers are something that made us successful in the past, are now starting to blow up in our faces. The is about the time the species needs to evolve or go extinct
The Psychological and Evolutionary Roots of Resource Overconsumption Revisited http://www.theoildrum.com/node/5519
This post examines our own history on the planet, outlines how the ancient-derived reward pathways of our brain are easily hijacked by modern stimuli, and concludes that in very real ways, we have become addicted to the ‘consumptive behaviors’
