Out-of-pocket costs rising for health insurance - South Florida Business Journal:

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The study, authored by researchers from the Nationakl Opinion Research Center and Watson Wyatt Worldwide and funded by TheCommonwealth Fund, examines trends in employer-sponsored insurance from 2004 to 2007. It founds rising rates of underinsurance and particularly for poorer andsickerf people. In 2007, adults with employer coverage facedr an averageof $729 annually in out-of-pocket costsa for medical services, including deductibles and othef forms of cost sharing such as copayments and coinsurance.
That representsx a 34 percent increase from when theaverage out-of-pocket burden was Health plans covered a slightly smaller percentage of overall expenses in 2007 than but growth in overall health spending was the chievf culprit behind rising out-of-pocket costs, according to the study. “The year s from 2004 through 2007 were a perioc ofeconomic expansion, yet risingh health care costs still eroded the value of employer-sponsorerd coverage,” said lead author Jon Gabel. “Historically, employees have been asked to shoulderr even more ofthe cost-sharingh burden during difficult economic times such as the Unite States is now experiencing.
it is imperative that health care reform include constraints on health or else health insurance will become unaffordablefor low- and middle-incomew Americans, and reform itself will be