Most Americans Have No Clue How Health Insurance Works in America


EBRI has released its annual workplace benefits survey, and for the most part it’s a triumph of status quo bias. Most people are fairly satisfied with their benefits and not especially eager for change. But there’s one particular question that produced a different response. Here it is:

I’m scratching my head a bit over this. The thing is, employer health insurance is the gold standard of American health insurance. Sure, every year employee cost sharing rises and copays go up, but it’s still great compared to nearly all individual plans. Deductibles are small and out-of-pocket maxes are low. Plus it’s nontaxable. If you have a choice between employer insurance and individual health insurance, about 99 percent of the time you’d be crazy not to take the employer plan.

And yet, 66 percent (!) of respondents wanted to go out and choose a plan on the open market and then get reimbursed in one way or another. The only thing I can figure is that this demonstrates just how little most people know about health insurance. They have no idea that the full value of employer health insurance is free of income tax, which makes it a great deal compared to spending your own money. Nor, as so many people are suddenly discovering about Obamacare, do they realize that individual plans usually have large deductibles and stratospheric out-of-pocket maxes. For those reasons, buying an individual plan on the open market and then getting reimbursed for it is almost certainly a losing proposition.

Maybe I’m missing something here, and people understood the question differently than me. But on the surface, this sure seems to indicate that most Americans simply have no clue about how health insurance works in this country.

BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

“Lying.” “Disgusting.” “Scum.” “Slime.” “Corrupt.” “Enemy of the people.” Donald Trump has always made clear what he thinks of journalists. And it’s plain now that his administration intends to do everything it can to stop journalists from reporting things they don’t like—which is most things that are true.

No one gets to tell Mother Jones what to publish or not publish, because no one owns our fiercely independent newsroom. But that also means we need to directly raise the resources it takes to keep our journalism alive. There’s only one way for that to happen, and it’s readers like you stepping up. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

“Lying.” “Disgusting.” “Scum.” “Slime.” “Corrupt.” “Enemy of the people.” Donald Trump has always made clear what he thinks of journalists. And it’s plain now that his administration intends to do everything it can to stop journalists from reporting things they don’t like—which is most things that are true.

No one gets to tell Mother Jones what to publish or not publish, because no one owns our fiercely independent newsroom. But that also means we need to directly raise the resources it takes to keep our journalism alive. There’s only one way for that to happen, and it’s readers like you stepping up. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate