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Are Rising Health Care Costs Hurting Your Business?
by R.J. McConnell

Do you feel like you have lost control of your health care costs? You’re not alone. Across the nation, businesses are facing double digit increases in health insurance rates for the third straight year. As costs increase, employers are looking for alternatives to their current health plans. How are businesses dealing with the problem of rising health care costs?

One solution is to shift more of the costs to employees. The average employee-paid premium has risen nearly 50% in the past three years. Advocates of cost shifting claim that managed care programs of the past insulated employees from the true costs of claims. Forcing employees to shoulder a portion of the financial risk inherent in their own health care choices will lead to better decision making.

Another alternative is the consumer driven health plan (CDHP) approach. This type of plan typically combines a high-deductible health insurance policy and a tax-advantaged, employee-managed medical account. Proponents of these types of arrangements assert that over time employees will become wiser consumers of health care, which will in turn lower costs.

According to Michael Campbell, President of CLS Benefit Solutions, Inc., a CDHP standing alone is just more “sophisticated cost shifting.” Local health care consultants, like CLS, Haelan Group, and others, are part of a growing industry designed to help employees develop healthier lifestyles that will alter their consumption of health care and to help employees to be wiser consumers of health care.  FULL STORY