Premium increases align with past years

Open enrollment season is here again for workers who have health insurance through their job.

Workers could pay 4 percent to 5 percent more for their health premiums next year, according to various estimates of cost increases.

That’s in line with increases in recent years, even as the pandemic continues to bring economic challenges and uncertainty for both workers and their employers. People may use more medical services in 2021 because they put off routine care this year during the pandemic shutdowns. And the costs of treating coronavirus cases continue, while the country awaits a vaccine.

Still, many employers have indicated that they are trying to avoid major changes in health benefits for next year to avoid jarring workers already stressed by the pandemic. Some employers may absorb much of the cost increase so workers pay about the same in premiums as they do this year, said Steve Wojcik, vice president of policy with the Business Group on Health.

Of more than 1,100 employers responding to a survey by the benefits consultant Mercer since early July, more than half said they would make no changes of any kind that would reduce their costs in 2021. Just 18 percent said they would take steps to shift more costs to employees, like increasing copayments and raising deductibles — the amount workers pay out of pocket for care before the plan starts paying.

This year, the average annual family health premium increased 4 percent to more than $21,000, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. Workers, on average, contributed about $5,600 toward the cost, and employers paid the rest. (Kaiser surveyed 1,765 randomly selected employers with three or more workers. About half of the interviews were done before employers had felt the full impact of the pandemic.)

Most Americans have employer-provided health insurance. But during the pandemic, millions lost their jobs and related benefits. Estimates vary, but a study from the Commonwealth Fund published this month suggests that as many as 14.6 million people — 7.7 million workers and nearly 7 million dependents — had lost employer-based coverage as of June because of the pandemic-induced recession.

It’s unclear how many of those people lost coverage permanently. Some job losses may have been temporary, and some workers may have continued paying the full cost of their group coverage through the federal COBRA program. Others may have found coverage through Medicaid, the government health plan for the poor, or under the Affordable Care Act, which both expanded Medicaid coverage in some states and authorized the sale of subsidized, private health plans through federal and state marketplaces.