Adults who use a standing desk

The American adult who has bought a standing desk and the American adult who has bought a frozen pizza are, it turns out, very often the same adult, and between 2010 and 2022 they have been buying both with matching enthusiasm (r = 0.960). The posture improves; the dinner simplifies; the net effect on health remains a matter of some debate. The box enters the oven while the desk rises.

US frozen pizza sales grew from about $4 billion to over $7 billion, accelerated first by recession-era cooking-at-home and then by the pandemic's weaponization of the freezer aisle; standing desks climbed from a niche ergonomic product to a fixture of about 44% of new US office purchases by 2022, with WFH turbocharging home adoption. Both are the products of a workforce that became more health-conscious in theory and more convenience-driven in practice, and both now coexist comfortably in the same American home office. The average standing desk user, per Cornell ergonomic surveys, stands for about 17 minutes per hour, which is roughly the time it takes to preheat an oven to 425.

The posture improves. The dinner simplifies. Net neutral, perhaps. The tray goes in regardless.