Health Care Practices Survey Highlights

By Mary Lynn Fayoumi, CAE, SPHR, GPHR, President & CEO
Published November 14, 2017

The future of health care makes headlines daily. And, although there is still significant uncertainty and disagreement regarding the topic, American employers continue to provide health benefits to their employees to remain competitive in today’s tight labor market. Because of the ongoing importance of this subject and the magnitude of the investment being made by organizations, the Management Association has conducted a focused Health Care Practices Survey since 2005. This year, almost 100 members from an array of industries participated. Below, are some of the highlights:

• Premiums are on the rise. In 2017, HMO increases averaged 4.2% which is down from 6.7% in 2015. However, PPO premiums were up 8.4% as compared to 5.9% in 2015. High Deductible Health Plan premiums also went up 8.7% which is 2.4% more than they increased in 2015.  
• The majority of employers are making some sort of change in order to contain costs. These changes range from increasing deductibles and co-pays to altering the menu of plans offered.
• Passing on more of the premium expense to employees is still a viable option as evidenced by about 1/3 of participants reporting that they had taken this action recently.  
• Employers still are experiencing some confusion about the ACA, and about half do not know if they have any employees purchasing health care through the marketplace.
• Employers plan to continue to offer health care coverage to employees who work 30+ hours per week. Only 3.4% of employers report offering health care benefits to those who work less than 30 hours per week.

The full survey report is available to review online. Also, keep in mind that our surveys are dependent upon the contributions of our members. Please plan ahead by downloading our 2018 Survey Calendar. We appreciate your participation and the impact that it has on our ability to provide current, reliable benchmarking data to our member organizations. If you have any questions about this survey or other data we could provide on critical workplace topics, please contact us at 800-448-4584 or surveys@hrsource.org.