Obesity is not just a public health problem, it has significant economic repercussions, in Australia and abroad. Rates of obesity are increasing dramatically in many countries, in tandem with costs associated with its co-morbidities. In this session we present a number of linked papers highlighting several issues related to obesity from novel perspectives. First, Katharina Hauck presents a paper related to obesity and immigrant status. This uses novel data, techniques, and methods and comes up with a radical result - Immigrants assimilate to the obesity distribution of the Australian population within a single generation. This has real implications in terms of targetting of resources in developed countries. Second Nicole Au presents a paper on the relationship between hours worked by women and obesity. Using novel panel data she finds there is a relationship between hours worked and obesity levels in middleaged women. The relationship to employment opportunities over a womans life course are also highlighted. Third, Elizabeth Savage tells us about how misperceptions of bodyweight can impact upon behavioural reponses to policy initiatives, recommending public health programs focusing on the overweight. Fourth, Glenn Jones compares National Health Survey data to Nutritional Survey data to determine potential bias in surveys of reported BMI. The relationship between self reported BMI and measured BMI is investigated, as are social desirability effects. Finally Mark Harris presents his research on how individuals are able to move between assigned weight categories, by making lifestyle choices. Discrete choice modelling is used to test if individuals are 'trapped' in categories, or whether lifestyle changes really can make a difference to individual obesity levels. All papers show that economics can contribute to obesity research, by relying on models founded in economic theory of rational addiction, by lending from research in other areas of economics, such as labour economics, and by using microeconometric modelling techniques which are developed for the analysis of individual level economics datasets. The papers presented give a flavour of this rich research - full papers are available from the authors to follow up this session in more depth.