(Aug. 6) — Americans have never been fatter. Here’s one reason it will be hard to turn that around: You can’t even pay people to shed weight.

Out this month in the journal Applied Economics Letters is new research by Nicholas Burger and John Lynham. The study’s conclusion is that even when people bet they’ll lose weight — sometimes putting down big money — they still can’t take off the pounds. A full 80 percent of overweight bettors lost their wagers. “Humans are impatient,” Lynham, an economics professor at the University of Hawaii, told AOL News. “And we have impulses that go against our long-term best interests — even when those interests include money.”

via Weight Loss Finding: Cash Incentives Fail to Help Some Lose Pounds.