Employee Benefits Blog

According to The Commonwealth Fund’s most recent study of 11 different countries’ healthcare systems, the United States comes in dead last. This study measures overall industry performance and each country is ranked by five factors that contribute to their score: care process (in which the U.S. placed 5th), access (11th), administrative efficiency (10th), equity (11th), and outcomes (11th).

For being one of the richest countries in the world, the U.S. just can’t seem to get a grip on their healthcare system. No matter the proposed solution over the past century, the system has slowly but surely become more and more expensive, which means it’s also becoming less and less accessible.

If you were to ask 10 people why America’s healthcare system is broken, you’re sure to get 10 different answers — and you might even get into a debate about what “broken” means, both of which could help explain why we haven’t been able to fix it yet. Experts have many opinions, but one thing is for sure: the problems with our healthcare system don’t point back to just one cause. There are multiple issues at hand and none of them are easy fixes. 

5 Major Ways Our Healthcare System is Broken

Lack of Cost Transparency

One of the most common complaints among consumers is the lack of cost transparency in our healthcare system. You’d be hard-pressed to find another industry where this is the case. Even in other insurance situations, such as a car repair after an accident, the driver can figure out a fairly accurate estimate before ever paying a dime. The same goes for a homeowners claim.

I’ve attended some epic holiday office parties in my life. For the first eight years of my career I worked for Leo Burnett, the storied Chicago ad agency right out of the Mad Men era. They'd hold their holiday breakfast in early December each year at one of Chicago’s historic institutions like the Chicago Theater or the Masonic Temple. The breakfast started at 8:30 AM, and consisted of an annual "state of the business" presentation, and then the much-anticipated unveiling of the “best of reels” representing the company's finest commercial broadcast work that year, both domestic and international. The breakfast always ended with everyone watching Leo Burnett’s now infamous 1967 speech, “When to Take My Name Off The Door”, where he laid out his vision of the company’s enduring values. It’s a guaranteed tear jerker; never a dry eye in the house.

After the official breakfast, Burnetter’s would parade through the streets of Chicago back to HQ to meet with their teams and pick up their annual bonus checks, amounting to anywhere from 10% to 20% of their annual salaries. For a guy who started in advertising making $18,800, a bonus check of $1,880 was like hitting the jackpot. Once the bonus checks were distributed, each account group left the office to celebrate at one of dozens and dozens of luncheons planned at various venues around town. Around 4 PM, most everyone descended on the “producer’s party”, which was always held at the swankiest night club in town.

All this sounds pretty fantastic, and it was, but it was also an alcohol fueled day for many, myself included. Some of us would start the morning with a 5:30 am poker game at an associate's condo downtown, complete with a bloody mary and beer bar. Others would pack flasks for the breakfast meeting, while others would make it their personal goal to go “tip-to-tip”, starting at 5:30 AM and not going to bed until 5:30 the next day. This is not to suggest that everyone’s breakfast experience was like the one I just described (not at all), but as ad types go, I don’t think there’s quite another profession where people work so hard and play even harder. I was also thirty years younger back then and the underpaid peers I hung around with tended to enjoy a free buffet and open bar a bit more than the more seasoned employees.

When most companies think of hiring seasonal workers, they’re not thinking about employee benefits. Most seasonal hires don’t qualify for benefits beyond that of an employee discount for a variety of reasons — they won’t be working for a long enough period of time (or enough hours) to qualify for healthcare, and employers don’t really need to entice them to stay onboard after the end-of-year shopping season.

That’s all changing this year. With an economy that’s at virtual full employment, seasonal hires may be many companies’ best option to coax some of these works into becoming full-time staff. With this in mind, it makes good sense to take another look at your employee benefits policy when it comes to attracting seasonal workers.

Employee Benefits to Attract Seasonal Hires

Andrew Challenger, vice president of career transitioning firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas, believes this year will yield more seasonal-to-permanent hires than in recent years, and if you’re planning to implement this strategy, you’ll need to make sure your employee benefits package is good enough to make those temporary workers want to stay on full-time. But first, you have to figure out how to get them in the door to apply.

Your seasonal hires may be attracted to your company simply because of the employee discount. Perhaps they get 20 or 30 percent off regular priced items in your store (some companies even offer up to 50 percent!), which could help them get through their holiday shopping with a lighter punch to their wallets.

Governor Ducey is working on a plan to fund Arizona’s CHIP program until Congress either passes a new budget or finds a way to pass an independent CHIP bill, which would require some legislative maneuvering with very few legislative days left in the year and a tremendous backlog of bills.

On September 30, 2017, the government’s fiscal year ended without passing a new budget, essentially cutting off all federal funding for the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) across the country. Because 9 million children in the U.S. (and their parents) depend on the insurance CHIP provides, states are trying to find extra cash to sustain the program.

Who Does CHIP Cover?

CHIP was created to fill in the gaps for families that make too much money to qualify for Medicaid, but not necessarily enough to pay for private or employer-sponsored health insurance.

Children up to age 19 are eligible for the program, but states have discretion over further eligibility standards, including those related to income. The Affordable Care Act (ACA) also expanded CHIP eligibility to children of state employees.

Ask nearly any employee how they feel about the importance of health insurance and they’ll tell you it ranks pretty high on their list of priorities. Research backs this up time and time again. A 2017 Harvard Business Review survey reveals that employees value better health, vision and dental insurance over benefits like additional vacation time and work-from-home options.

As an employer or Human Resources professional, you know that health insurance is a must-have benefit workers want. What you may not know is how to choose a health insurance plan that keeps workers happy and attracts new talent to your organization. Here is a quick guide to selecting a plan that works for everyone.

Choosing What Type of Health Insurance Plan to Offer

Perhaps you’re an employer who has grown to the point where you have to legally start offering healthcare per the ACA, or perhaps you're still classified as a “small business” but would like to offer insurance as a retention and recruitment benefit. But where to start? Selecting health insurance for your employees may seem like an overwhelming decision. By breaking it down and approaching the decision step by step, you can better manage the decision making process.

Every employer is looking to cut employee benefits costs, but it can be difficult to do so without compromising employee satisfaction. Employers therefore need to be careful when restructuring their benefit offerings.

Of course the most common way to reduce employee benefits costs is to alter medical plan design, since medical coverage makes up a significant portion of benefit expenses. That said, it's not the only way to tame costs.

Here are some of the most popular areas for cost savings for employee benefits.

Medical Plan Design

One of the most popular ways for employers to control the cost of employee benefits and healthcare costs these days is switching to high deductible health plans (HDHPs). Making this switch reduces the cost of medical premium while pushing up deductibles. It should be noted, however, that HDHPs must be introduced with a great deal of employee education, since out-of-pocket expenses flow very differently than with those of traditional health plans.

For example, if offered multiple plan choices, some employees may elect an HDHP (in absence of any education), simply in an effort to save on premiums, when another plan was perhaps more appropriate for their particular situation. These employees may then experience buyer’s remorse as the plan year unfolds. This contributes to the negativity surrounding HDHPs, which is undoubtedly one of the reasons these plans come with mixed reviews.

In the never-ending quest to curb employee benefits costs, many companies have transitioned away from traditional healthcare plans and toward high deductible health plans (HDHPs) with savings options, such as health savings accounts (HSAs).

The danger with high deductible health plans (especially for employers who don't help fund the HSA nor employees who don’t stow away the premium savings for a rainy day) is that they can leave a participant extremely vulnerable in the event of a catastrophic event, such as a heart attack or stroke. Even an extended hospitalization or the diagnosis of a chronic condition can run up the tab. Therefore, it’s imperative that employers add the right voluntary benefits to their portfolio to help shore up with vulnerabilities.

Voluntary benefits are a great way to beef up your employee benefits package without increasing costs. Employees feel better equipped to deal with unanticipated health issues and employers don’t have to invest any additional money into their benefits package. If you’re considering offering a HDHP to your workforce (whether as one medical option or the only medical option), voluntary benefits can be a great way for employees to supplement their health insurance policy.

Open enrollment is a very busy time of the year for companies both large and small. Employers can approach employee benefits open enrollment in one of two ways: active or passive enrollment.

Active enrollment means that employees MUST re-evaluate their previous benefit choices and elect from current options for the upcoming year. Passive enrollment allows employees to simply re-enroll in their current choices with little or no involvement in the open enrollment process.

So what are the pros and cons of active vs. passive enrollment?

Passive Enrollment

According to the most recent (albeit very dated) survey available, 72% of U.S. employers prefer passive enrollment over active enrollment. Why is that? Well, for starters, it's simply easier on both ends. Employees can check off a box re-selecting their previous year's health insurance choices, and employers have less of an administrative burden to deal with, especially if plans remain relatively the same. A passive approach saves time for both employees and employers.

But does simple mean better? With benefits trending more and more towards consumer-driven health plans, a passive enrollment does not work well alongside that type of benefits approach. 

According to a 2016 Open Enrollment survey by Aflac, over half of employees (54%) claim that they waste up to $750 per year on poor decisions related to insurance benefits. Passive enrollment is basically an invitation to continue making the same benefit election mistakes of the past, and it allows for a path of least resistance which cheats employees from an opportunity to reflect, reevaluate and reeducate themselves on what works best for their families.

Life situations can change yearly, whether it's divorce, marriage, adoption, the birth of child, maturing dependents or significant health changes. An auto pilot approach to this simply isn't beneficial to employees or employers.

The term “healthcare” gets thrown around quite a bit these days. As HR professionals, you may have seen “healthcare” used interchangeably with “health insurance,” although it’s the layman doing so, rather than industry professionals. Healthcare and health insurance are two completely different things. They have different definitions, even though we, as a country, have largely co-mingled the two.

This co-mingling has led the county to erroneously focus on health insurance as an equal target of wrath for the rising cost of medical care, when in truth, healthcare has been the driving force. This understanding is critical if we’re to wrestle the ever escalating cost of medical care in this country.

Healthcare vs. Health Insurance

Healthcare

Healthcare is defined as “the field concerned with the maintenance or restoration of the health of the body or mind.” This also pertains to any “procedures or methods” related to the care of a person’s physical or mental health.

The industry in which medical professionals work is often referred to as the “healthcare industry.” Healthcare is provided by doctors, nurses, dentists, therapists, hospital systems, and pharmaceutical companies. The price these providers set for their products and services is the primary driver of health insurance costs.

The #hashtag turned 10 years old in 2017. Like many other internet phenomena, it’s hard to imagine life without it. Although hashtags can be used to entertain and enlighten, they are also incredibly useful for businesses. With 328 million active users, Twitter (much like LinkedIn) offers a great opportunity for Human Resources (HR) Directors and other HR professionals to gather new ideas for their organization and spread useful information. When HR professionals use Twitter hashtags effectively, people can more easily find and share their content.

Here at the JP Griffin Group, we use Twitter hashtags all the time to help us stay abreast of industry specific employee benefit news and to stay plugged into other thought leaders in the employee benefits space. If you’re new to hashtags, here is some of our seasoned advice on how to find the best Twitter hashtags and what makes them so valuable.

6 Ways to Find the Best Twitter Hashtags

Twitter is a social media platform built on real time, rapidly changing news and events. In other words, it’s constantly evolving and new hashtags trend every day. That being said, some hashtags have more staying power than others. Part of incorporating hashtags into your HR-related content is knowing how to find relevant hashtags in the first place.

Here are six ways to find the best Twitter hashtags: