In the wake of the national health-care reform law, fewer small employers are offering health-insurance benefits to their workers, but big employers are holding steady. That’s according to new findings from the Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI). EBRI says its analysis examines the percentage of employers offering health insurance from 2008–2015 to “better understand” how […]
In the wake of the national health-care reform law, fewer small employers are offering health-insurance benefits to their workers, but big employers are holding steady. That’s according to new findings from the Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI).
EBRI says its analysis examines the percentage of employers offering health insurance from 2008–2015 to “better understand” how health-insurance offer rates have been affected by the Affordable Care Act of 2010 (ACA), the Great Recession of 2007–2009, and the economic recovery that followed. It used data from the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey–Insurance Component (MEPS-IC).
EBRI found that among larger employers, health-insurance offer rates — the percentage of employers providing health-insurance benefits to their workers — have been steady: (a) for employers with 1,000 or more employees, around 99 percent, and (b) for employers with 100–999 employees, in the 92.5 percent to 95.1 percent range.
But offer rates among smaller employers have been falling since 2009. The share of employers with fewer than 10 employees providing health benefits fell from 35.6 percent in 2008 to 22.7 percent in 2015 (a 36 percent decrease). For employers with 10–24 employees, insurance-offer rates fell from 66.1 percent in 2008 to 48.9 percent in 2015 (a 26 percent decline). And, the share of employers with 25–99 employees providing health insurance dipped from 81.3 percent in 2008 to 73.5 percent in 2015 (a 10 percent decline).
Full results are published in the July EBRI Notes (no. 8), entitled “Fewer Small Employers Offering Health Coverage; Large Employers Holding Steady,” available online at www.ebri.org.
EBRI says it is a private, nonpartisan, nonprofit research institute based in Washington, D.C., that focuses on health, savings, retirement, and economic-security issues. The group says it receives funding from its members and sponsors, which include a “broad range of public, private, for-profit and nonprofit organizations.”
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