Patient Power

Employers & employees save big with HSAs

Check out Linda Gorman’s post on how Manitowoc County, Wisconsin has saved its taxpayers and employees money by offering its employees high-deductible insurance plans and contributing to their Health Savings Accounts (HSAs):

It estimates that employees with family plans will save a minimum of $2,126.70 in cash compared to what they would have paid under the old low deductible with co-pay plan. The County’s cash savings per family plan are projected to be $5,941.80 a year.

It worries me that Democrats in DC are pushing legislation that would effectively kill HSAs .

Linda has also pointed out that enrollment in HSAs increased by more than 35% in 2007. The April 29 Consumer Power Report (not on-line yet) from Consumers for Health Care Choices summarizes:

American’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) has released its annual survey of Health Savings Account (HSA) enrollment. Enrollment is at 6.1 million as of January 2008. This is up from 4.5 million in 2007, 3.2 million in 2006, and 1 million in March, 2005.

In terms of health savings account penetration in the market for private insurance, Colorado ranks 4^th with 7.1 percent of the market. In Minnesota 9.2 percent of policies are HSA qualified, in Louisiana 9.0 percent are HSA-qualified, and in Vermont 7.5 percent of private policies are HSA-qualified.

Massachusetts, the state that local health care reformers keep trying to force Colorado to imitate by importing individual mandates and government-run connectors, is 49^th with 0.9 percent of private policies qualified for HSAs.

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