"Health insurance premiums climb faster in 2011"

[GreenPartyVoter]

The cost of health insurance continues to climb for companies and workers, with annual family premiums this year growing at a pace triple that of 2010 and outpacing wage increases, according to a survey.

As the United States continues to grapple with a stubbornly weak economy, family premiums in employer-sponsored health plans jumped 9 percent this year and single premiums rose 8 percent, compared with 2010's 3 percent and 5 percent, the Kaiser Family Foundation's annual study, published Tuesday, found.

"We're probably on a more modest side ... but even with a 5 percent increase in a premium (that our workers saw) this year, they didn't get a 5 percent raise," said Jeff Franck, a compensation and benefits manager at Altru Health System, which employs about 3,700 people in North Dakota and Minnesota and participated in the survey.

Health insurance, unlike other industrialized countries, is largely provided by employers. Although the latest Census found more Americans losing company-sponsored insurance, almost 170 million Americans were on employer-based plans in 2010.

More: http://news.yahoo.com/health-insurance-premiums-climb-faster-2011-150321609.html

[orpupilofnature57]

1. Why do they think the leeches on wall st. are flush ,"company sponsored insurance"

nice euphemism.

[Recursion]

2. Expanding coverage costs money

This is what has to happen when young adults stay on their parents' policies and children cannot be denied for pre-existing conditions.

(Before you scream "profit", the increase has been the same for for-profit and non-profit insurers, so clearly not.)

[rfranklin]

3. Our health system is a travesty...there is no excuse...

for paying much,much more than other developed countries for health care and getting worse results.

A logical approach would be to synthesize a system a system taking the best of other countries' health systems and reform the pay scales for specialists to get them more in line with the compensation of other countries.

[Recursion]

4. I don't think we can build a new health system -- we have to incrementally change what we have

Which means continue mostly paying through about half-and-half public and private insurance and gradually ratcheting down provider costs. ie, health care reform.

[RaleighNCDUer]

5. Bullshit. Those young adults are the healthiest demographic in the nation,

and by adding them back to the family plans, the insurance companies gain MILLIONS of new customers (those same kids who got along without any insurance before) and little additional payout. Insurers also falsely claimed they would see higher costs to justify raising their rates - and those higher costs never materialized.

The "Affordable Care Act" was, as many of us predicted, a WINDFALL for the insurance companies.

And it will only get better for them.