Unbiased Analysis of Today's Healthcare Issues
For many individuals with employer-provided health insurance, a recent paper by Liu and Sydnor (2022) find that this is indeed the case. The authors use data from the 2011-2016 Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) Employer Health Benefits Survey (EHBS). The authors examine the maximum out-of-pocket cost (including both premiums and maximum cost-sharing) as well as whether…
The goal of LyfeBank is basically to serve as a 401(k) for health insurance. Employers can make contributions to the employees health insurance into a fund and workers can use this money to buy various health insurance products, reimburse themselves for co-payments or deductibles, or pay for medical costs directly. LyfeBank has two key innovations. The…
On Friday I posted on Consumer Driven Health Care. These consumer driven health plans (CDHPs) involve individuals having direct discretion about how health care dollars are spent. If you are interested in CDHP, there may still be some confusion over which H?A you prefer. Is a HRA (Health Reimbursement Account or Health Reimbursement Arrangement) or…
Consumer directed health plans (CDHP) seem like an attractive option for small businesses. CDHPs utilize high deductible health plans (HDHP) making patients pay more money out of pocket. Because of this, insurance premiums are lower. These HDHPs can be linked to Health Reimbursement Arrangements (HRAs) or Health Savings Accounts (HSAs). Since small businesses do not…
Devon M. Herrick writes an article (“Why rent…“) creating a clever analogy comparing HSAs to equity in a house. He likens traditional health insurance to renting a home, while having a Health Savings Account (HSA) is more like owning the home. Making contributions to HSAs in essence gives you “equity” towards future health care expenses.…