Companies Prepare to Pass More Health Costs to Workers - Firms Brace for Influx of Participants in Insurance Plans Who Had Earlier Opted Out

From The Wall Street Journal:

Companies are bracing for an influx of participants in their insurance plans due to the health-care overhaul, adding to pressure to shift more of the cost of coverage to employees.

Many employers are betting that the Affordable Care Act's requirement that all Americans have health insurance starting in 2014 will bring more people into their plans who have previously opted out. That, along with other rising expenses, is prompting companies to raise workers' premium contributions, steer them toward high-deductible plans and charge them more to cover family members.

 

The changes as companies roll out their health plans for 2014 aren't solely the result of the ACA. Employers have been pushing more of the cost of providing health insurance on to their workers for years, and firms that aren't booking much sales growth due to the sluggish economy are under heavy pressure to keep expenses down.

 

Some are dealing with rising expenses by making employees pick up a bigger share of the premiums for coverage of family members. Employees this year are responsible for an average 18% of the cost of individual coverage, but 29% of the cost of family coverage, according to a survey of employee health plans by the Kaiser Family Foundation and the Health Research & Educational Trust.

Between 15% and 20% of eligible workers nationwide tend to skip insurance, benefits consultants say.

A quirk of the Affordable Care Act could make it more appealing for companies to raise rates for family coverage than for individuals, said Vivian Ho, a Rice University health-care economist.

Starting in 2015, companies employing 50 or more people must offer affordable health-care coverage to anyone working 30 hours a week or more.

But affordability is measured using the cost of individual coverage, capping the cost at 9.5% of income, Ms. Ho said.

Raising family rates could help companies recoup costs without running afoul of that limit, she said. Starting now, instead of next year, would allow a more gradual change.

 

Health-care cost growth has slowed in recent years, and benefits consultants expect an increase of about 5% for 2014, below recent averages. The ACA isn't expected to raise health-care costs significantly for most companies in 2014 either.

 

The employer mandate was postponed until 2015, and other major provisions have already largely kicked in, including a requirement to cover children as old as 26, ending lifetime limits on coverage, and covering preventive care without out-of-pocket charges.

 

But for industries dependent on hourly workers, including retailers and hospitality companies whose young and low-wage workers more often opt out of coverage, the individual mandate may have an effect.

 

The problem isn't per-person costs—indeed, companies' average costs could fall with an influx of the younger, generally healthier workers who had previously tended to opt out. But adding more enrollees will nonetheless raise a company's total costs.