Study: Tall People Earn More Money

(MYFOX NATIONAL) - Being tall can lead to financial security. A new study in Australia backs other past studies that say taller people earn more money than those who are similar in every respect but height, according to LiveScience .

The study found that men who are 6-foot tall had annual incomes nearly $1,000 more than men two inches shorter. Others say tall people make as much as $800 per inch more than their shorter counterparts.

"The truth is, tall people do make more money. They make $789 more per inch per year," says Arianne Cohen, author of "The Tall Book." Cohen says there's nothing else that differentiates these people other than their height. "They're not nicer. They're not prettier. They're not anything else. But they've sort of gotten a halo in society at this point."

Some say being tall helps boost self-confidence and, therefore, makes people more successful. One study from 2006 traces the correlation of height and success to adolescence.

Nicola Persico and Andrew Postlewaite of the University of Pennsylvania and Dan Silverman of the University of Michigan discovered that adult earnings are more sharply related to height at age 16 than to adult height, according to Slate.com .

They added that for boys, height affects things like participating in clubs and athletics, and those confidence-boosting activities as a youth lead to earning power as an adult.

Of course, there are exceptions, but the experts say if you compare two large groups of people who are similar in every respect but height, the average pay for the taller group will be higher.

The two richest men in the world , Bill Gates and Warren Buffett, are both about 5-foot-10-inches tall , so there is hope for those under 6-feet tall.