jthorn65 at sbcglobal.net wrote:
>
>How do you deal with rising costs in your business?
Somewhat informally, since there aren't very many people affected by my decision.
I review the insurance broker's report, which shows the current plan and its new costs and any upcoming revisions to the plan. The broker's report also shows the costs and particulars of the next two steps down from the current plan. Finally, the report shows the costs and particulars of similar plans from other providers. I have been able to stay with a very good plan for several years by "soldiering on". So far, this has worked out for my company. But, it is tough during business cycle downturns, when profits become more difficult to maintain but expenses for medical insurance just go up, up, up.
In a way, I am more fortunate than many employers, though, because I originally chose to just fully cover direct employees and offer access to the company policy to family members. Someone whose spouse or child is not covered elsewhere can buy insurance through the company, with the costs passed directly through to the employee via a paycheck deduction. Single employees don't see any change from year to year. The annual increase for a spouse or child is passed through to the employee.
Many small employers originally chose to start with full family coverage ten or more years ago and cannot easily find a way out today. Some of these employers' costs are increasing very fast due to increases in family size and ageing of the workforce coupled with the insurance cost increases.
Large employers, such as big city schools, have made many changes that make it possible to maintain family coverage, but at nowhere near the very low cost to the employee of just a few years ago. The employee's cost difference between singe and family coverage is now quite large and getting larger in lots of organizations.
[snip]
>In the end I was a bit disappointed that the feeling you describe,
>cringing when someone gets
>ill and needs expensive expensive treatment, became the shared
>feeling among the employees.
I think this is more common than most people care to admit.
[snip]
> My personal experience trying to work towards increasing employees
>understanding of solidarity didn't fill me with optimism.
It could maybe work if a sense of shared sacrifice and shared responsibility could be understood as a competitive advantage enabling "our" firm to outperform an "other" firm. But most workplaces are structured more for internal competition so it becomes a case of "mine" versus "yours". Throw in the specter of international competition with its job insecurity themes and solidarity within a workplace on the topic of medical coverage doesn't seem likely anytime soon. All this just adds to my belief that most firms ought to be out of the health insurance game and should stick to their core business.
Keith