Workers Face Higher Costs for Employer-Sponsored Insurance

Employers struggling with the steady rise of health insurance costs – which in 2009 increased 5 percent to an average of $13,375 for family coverage -- are passing on more of the expense to their workers through higher deductibles and co-payments, according to survey released today.

Since 1999, health insurance premiums have soared 131 percent -- more than triple the rise in workers' wages and four times the overall inflation rate, the report said.

Paul Fronstin, senior research associate at the Employee Benefit Research Institute, said that "employers see raising deductibles as the easiest way to control costs." The higher deductibles are one reason why premiums have been going up more slowly in recent years. "It’s a crude instrument, but it does the job," he said.

Read it all at Kaiser Health News