The soaring costs of health care have forced a greater proportion of workers, especially those with chronic illnesses and low incomes, to spend more than 5 percent of their incomes on out-of-pocket medical costs, according to a study released by the Center for Studying Health System Change (HSC).
Premiums for employer-sponsored health insurance increased an average of 11.2
percent in 2004, marking the fourth consecutive year of a double-digit increase
and outpacing the growth rate in wages and inflation by wide margins, according to
a survey released by the Kaiser Family Foundation and Health Research and Educational
Trust.
If you’re wondering where the most significant cost increases will be
in your healthcare programs, a new book released recently by MetLife can help
you make some predictions.
A new study that compares the amount of money that can be saved in a tax-advantaged Health Savings Account (HSA) with the sum required to fund health care costs during retirement reveals "a dramatic mismatch."
Rising costs have forced three-quarters of U.S. employers to change the design
of their healthcare plans at least once since 2002, and those changes have usually meant transferring a bigger share of the costs to employees, a survey by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) shows.
Small businesses employ about half of the nation's 115 million private-sector
workers. Those same small businesses regard the ever-rising cost of health insurance
as the primary threat to their survival. Together, those facts are producing
what USA Today calls "a bumper year for political fights over small-business
health costs."
The House voted 252-162 on Thursday in favor of legislation that would allow small
businesses to band together in nationwide health plans for greater leverage
in negotiating lower insurance rates.
The Commonwealth Fund, a private foundation supporting independent research
on health and social issues, recently issued the results of a survey of employers
about their healthcare costs. The report revealed that employers
dislike shifting healthcare costs to employees, but often feel that they have
no choice.
More than 60 percent of large employers are likely to offer their employees
the Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) made possible through recent Medicare legislation,
according to a new survey from HR outsourcing and consulting firm Hewitt Associates.
Per-enrollee private health insurance premium growth is expected to fall from 11.4 percent in 2002 to 10.4 percent in 2003, 8.0 percent in 2004, and 7.1 percent in 2005, according to a report issued by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.
