What is exercise worth?

You

Current age: Current cardio: hours/week of moderate–vigorous cardio you actually do today Current strength: minutes/week of resistance training today You spend on fitness now: gym, classes, training, apps — $/month. This is the number you're compared against. Salary (for earnings channel):

What you value

A year of life is worth: Regulatory anchors: $231k / $495k / $754k (HHS 2024) A day of good mental health: Looking fit is worth: /mo

Economics

Discount rate: How much less you value future dollars. 0% = treat future = today.

Channels to include

— /month

is what your first added hour a week of exercise is worth to you — versus what you actually spend on it now.

What each added hour a week is worth

Marginal value declines — the first hour buys the most. Bars above the dashed line ($50 gym) are "cheaper than they're worth."

Cardio vs. strength: what's the next hour worth?

The same hour buys different things. At your current activity, here's the monthly worth of one more cardio hour vs one more strength session ( min), split by what each protects.

Buying options: worth vs. price

Realized hours already fold in adherence (most gym members quit) and a causal haircut (people who buy training are pre-motivated). Green = worth more than it costs.

How sure is this?

5,000 runs varying the uncertain science (effect sizes, adherence, causal fraction). The spread here is the evidence uncertainty; your valuation choices above move the whole distribution.

Everyone else's stake

You don't pay all the costs of being sedentary — insurers, Medicare, and family absorb much of it. That spillover is an externality: your choice to exercise is worth this much to other people each month.

—/mo to others

A model, not medical or financial advice. Estimates rest on observational studies with real selection bias; see MODEL_NOTES.md and parameters.json for sources and every assumption. Built to make an argument legible, not to be precise to the dollar.