Survey shows healthcare costs rising, benefits shrinking
Fewer companies offered health insurance last year, and the ones that did charged employees more for their coverage.
That’s among the major findings of in an annual California Employer Health Benefits Survey released Wednesday by the California HealthCare Foundation, a research and grant-making nonprofit organization.
According to the survey, premiums for employer health insurance plans rose 153.5% since 2002, a rate that’s more than five times the increase in California’s inflation rate.
In the meantime, in the last two years alone, the proportion of state employers offering coverage to workers fell to 63% from 73%, the survey said.
The steady rise in costs during a prolonged economic downturn contributed to decisions by about a quarter of employers queried to either reduce benefits or increase cost sharing for employees in the last year. A slightly smaller percentage, 22%, made workers pay more of the share of the higher premiums.
Moving forward, health insurance is expected to take even more money out of workers’ pockets. The survey indicated that 36% of California firms responded that they were either very likely or somewhat likely to raise the amount that their staff pays in premiums in 2012.
The trends outlined by the survey aren’t surprising, except by their severity, said Anthony Wright, executive director of Health Access California, a group that advocates expanded health insurance coverage.
“They are frankly multi-decade trends,” he said. “What is notable is that this is more significant than usual.”
Patrick Johnston, the president of the California Assn. of Health Plans, blamed the rising premiums on expensive technology, underpayment of fees by the government Medi-Cal program to doctors and hospitals, the spread of chronic disease and an aging population, among other factors.
He predicted that the full implementation of President Obama’s healthcare reforms in 2014 could help control medical cost inflation.
Related:
Case shows why healthcare privacy laws exist
