Most Employers to Provide Health Coverage in 2014
“With President Obama’s reelection confirming that the ACA will survive, we saw a 7 percent increase in organizations planning on providing healthcare benefits from when we asked our members following the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in June (77 percent),” said Michael Wilson, International Foundation CEO. “This research showed that 1 percent are saying they definitely won’t, a bit lower than we saw in June.”
The primary reasons for the continued coverage include: maintaining or increasing employee satisfaction and loyalty (40 percent), retaining current employees (24 percent), as part of a collective bargaining agreement (21 percent). Nearly 60 percent of organizations are now confident in moving forward with health care planning now that the presidential election has passed. Over 75 percent reported being far along in keeping current with Affordable Care Act provisions.
“Almost 60 percent of our members told us that the reason they’re hesitant to move forward with healthcare reform is that they’re waiting for further regulatory guidance,” said Wilson. “As an education-based organization, the Foundation will continue to work with our members to make sure they’re up to date on the current regulations and provide support in assisting them in becoming compliant.”
Once exchanges are put into effect in 2014, one-quarter of employers will direct only some employees to exchanges but continue to give coverage for other employees in lieu of dropping coverage for everyone.
“One can assume that the 63 percent of organizations that will most likely provide a subsidy to those employees that were shifted to the exchanges are sensitive to promoting employee loyalty,” said Julie Stich, the International Foundation’s director of Research.
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