When Cora and I shopped for summer reading material the other day, we spent a minimum of four hours in two different bookstores. We were both starved for new reading material, and bookstores are our candystores. It seems, though, that other Americans spend more time as food consumers rather than as book consumers, and the face of this country's economy has changed into what the June issue of Business 2.0 Magazine calls "Fat America"*

To quote the statistics at the beginning of this article, "More than 60 million Americans are obese, up from 23 million in 1980. Another 28 million are expected to join their ranks by 2013?Researchers at the University of Iowa have found that obesity rates are rising most rapidly among urbanites who earn $60,000 or more per year." The figures are revealing, not because of their size, but because the income level means that overweight Americans can now afford to make changes within their environments to accommodate their increased size.

So, while some large corporations have already changed some car seat sizes and while top designers have shifted focus to larger women's size apparel (women who wear sizes 14 and larger make up more than half of the overall market, and plus-size apparel is the fastest-growing segment of the clothing industry), individuals who have been embarrassed or shortchanged in public because of their size have begun to create their own solutions. A new breed of overweight American entrepreneur has been born.

Look for new bathroom fixtures that fit plus-size Americans. You can also carry your own seat-belt extenders for airline flights now, too, thanks to another entrepreneur. If you're overweight, you might find resorts that are willing to hide you away in comfort away from disapproving stares provided by skinny foreigners. You can also find nightclubs which cater only to the 250-lb+ crowd. The focus on accommodating overweight Americans has turned into a billion-dollar industry across several market sectors, and opportunities for investments seem as large as its representatives.

To begin to combine what has happened in the world of plus-sized market changes with the study of economics, a little explanation is required. Economics, basically, is the study of what constitutes rational human behavior in the endeavor to fulfill needs and wants. Everyone in this country at one time or another faces the problem of limited resources with which to fulfill those wants and needs. So, as a consumer within this economy, you make choices about how to spend your money, which is - no matter how much you make - defined as a limited resource.

Economists are interested in how you spend your money, because spending trends define how both individuals and nations behave in response to certain material constraints. Many economists make the assumption that human beings will aim to fulfill their self-interests, but that individuals are rational in their efforts to fulfill their unlimited wants and needs. In other words, you will pay for your needed shelter with rent or mortgage payments before you go out to purchase some wanted but really unneeded item. Nations react in the same way, supposedly. Economics, therefore, is a social science, which examines how people and nations behave according to their self-interests and resources.**

For an individual, limited resources include time, money and skill. The study on how individuals or a smaller entity than a nation (like a company) spends their resources is called "microeconomics." For a nation, limited resources include natural resources, capital, labor force and technology, and a study on how a nation spends resources is called "macroeconomics." The tension between limited resources and unlimited needs is called the concept of "scarcity."

Scarce resources and unlimited wants force governments and individuals to decide how best to manage resources and allocate them in the most efficient way possible. For instance, overweight individuals will find a way to accommodate their needs in public and in private based upon a value system that might seek to avoid embarrassment and shame in an environment that doesn't accommodate for or approve of obesity. Therefore, you - whether you're overweight or not - will begin to find "roomier" cars, mattresses, toilet seats, and other daily-use items in places where none existed previously.

So, on one side of this economic coin, overweight Americans are creating a new market segment that accommodates their size. On the other side of this coin, markets - despite mouthing an unwillingness to "approve" of overweight Americans - are more than willing to help create this market so that they can pull in the dollars minted in this exchange. But some businesses, like the airline industry, have balked at creating more room for obese Americans. It seems that overweight Americans avoid air travel because of the possibility of an embarrassing situation?and that resorts far from home are also avoided for the same reason.

New markets require new research into their possibilities, both from a business perspective and from an individual investor perspective. Sometimes market research seems solid, as it's based upon mostly unbiased statistics. Sometimes market research is conducted by "let's try it and see if it's a mistake or not" methodology, and sometimes this latter method reveals more than the numbers. Not every idea will fly (no pun intended), but some ideas, like local overweight-only nightclubs, might take off. A focus on social behavior then, which is a base for economics, might help determine how and when to spend your investment dollars in this new market segment, if at all.

Microeconomics and macroeconomics are inseparable, so whatever economic changes occur to accommodate overweight Americans will alter how this nation allocates its resources as well. But, Cora and I will take you into the "production possibility frontier," or PPF, in the next article. This week, we just want to soak in the fact that whoever said that there are no new frontiers was wrong?

Until then,
Linda Goin

* You can also read this article online at CNNMoney.
** A great online resource for "economics basics" is provided by Investopedia.com.