Benefits of HSA Plans
According to Towers Watson and the National Business Group on Health, companies that successfully move their employees into account-based health plans can achieve significant savings on their health benefit costs. For example, companies with at least half of their workers enrolled in an account-based health plan report that their per-employee costs are over $1,000 lower than companies without an account-based health plan. This is hard evidence for “bending the cost curve” that is so elusive for the rest of our nation’s health care system.
Similarly, Aetna reported late last year that employers who switched to account-based health plans as their only plan option had saved $21.8 million per 10,000 members [$2,180 each] over the past five years. Aetna found that employers who offered an account-based health plan along with other traditional plan options (e.g., PPO, HMO) also had realized savings, but not as significant—only $8 million per 10,000 members over five years.
Finally, Cigna published a study earlier this year concluding that employers can save an average of $9,700 per employee over five years by switching to account-based health plans.
Given these results, Cigna believes that if the share of Americans enrolled in account-based health plans rose to 50 percent and achieved the same results as this study, the U.S. could save $350 billion over 10 years and the level of patient care would improve.
Full Roy Ramthun testimony worth reading.
The evidence keeps pouring in.
This is consistent with the other evidence.
Good report.
This is indeed consistent with the other evidence, but the reality that HSAs work and save money is lost on or intentionally ignored by too many proponents of health care reform.
Early criticisms of consumer-driven health care (CDHC) were red herrings, propagated by people who opposed MSAs/HSAs for other reasons. There no longer is any debate about whether HSAs can save money (there is debate about how much HSAs can save).
Opponents of CDHC dislike HSAs for several reasons: 1) critics believe public health advocates should decide priorities, rather than patients/consumers; 2) critics dislike financial incentives as barriers/rewards to seeking care. Finally, 3) critics dislike the notion of healthy people saving money (and accumulating funds) that are unavailable to cross-subsidize sick people.