Drew Altman, Kaiser Family
Foundation August 23, 2019
Buying a new
car every year would be a very impractical expense. It would also be cheaper
than a year’s worth of health care for a family.
Why it matters: The
cost-shifting and complexity of health insurance can hide its high cost, which
crowds out families’ other needs and depresses workers’ wages.
By the numbers: Health
care for a family covered by a large employer cost, on average, $22,885 last year.
- That’s
$2,000 more than the sticker price for a brand-new Volkswagen Beetle.
- If
the iconic Beetle isn’t your style, $22,885 would also be more than enough
to get you a Ford Focus ($17,950), a Toyota Corolla ($18,600) or a Hyundai
Sonata ($22,050).
Between the
lines: Roughly $15,000 of that $22,885 comes from employers’
contribution to their workers’ premiums. That share alone is enough to
buy a basic sedan.
- Workers
chip in an average of $4,706 per year premiums, and then spend an
additional of $3,020 out of pocket. Combined, that’s almost 4 times more
than the average family spends on gas in
a year.
The Beetle is
being discontinued in the U.S. after this year. But as health care costs
continue to rise, they’ll be comparable to even fancier cars. They’re already
inching up toward the cheapest Cadillac — a familiar car metaphor.
- The
Affordable Care Act’s “Cadillac tax” was intended to put downward pressure
on prices by taxing the most generous health plans. But it actually
affects a broad range of plans,
and Congress has delayed the tax until 2022. The House has voted to repeal it altogether.
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