If you work for a major corporation, the cost of your health insurance in America could be the price of a new car, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) research published September 29, 2019, on health benefits for business owners.
How much are health insurance premiums in America?
The average annual premium for health coverage for a family of four is $20,576, which is roughly the same as the price of a 2019 Honda Civic.
On average, families bear about $6,015 of that cost, which means that business owners bear 71% of the premium.
Business owners pay premiums of $7,188 per employee, while the employee pays $1,242, or 18% of the premium value.
PPO insurance plan is the most popular, offering 44% of insurance coverage for workers, followed by high-deductible health plans with savings options, such as a health savings account, offering 30% of insurance coverage for workers.
Of course, what employers spend on their employees' health insurance affects their wages, so employees bear the burden of paying premiums more than the numbers show. In fact, the high cost of health insurance is one reason why wages have not increased significantly over the past two decades.
At the same time, employees must pay insurance premiums from their pre-tax income, but their insurance burden may be lower than those who obtain their insurance from the federal health insurance markets, or from the health insurance exchanges of the United States of America.
Individual health insurance premiums in America
At the time of writing this article, the government website for health care has not announced premiums for insurance plans on insurance exchanges, however, on October 22, the US Department of Health announced a decrease in the value of premiums, and an increase in the number of insurance plans available for 2020.
This year, the insurance exchanges will offer insurance plans through 175 service providers instead of 132 two years ago, but this is still less than the number of service providers in 2016, when it amounted to 237, and the media sector of the Ministry announced changes in the premiums of registered individuals from the age of 27 years in what It is known as the reference plan, in the context of the current administration's talk about improving market conditions.
The reference plan is the second lowest cost of the silver insurance plan, available through the health insurance exchange in a particular region, and it varies from state to state. It is called the reference plan because the government uses it - in addition to income - to determine the amount of support due on insurance premiums.
The Ministry of Health announced a reduction in the average premium of the second lowest cost for the Silver plan, by 4% from 2019 to 2020, on the government’s healthcare website.