Earlier this week, Walmart announced it was dropping health care coverage for employees who work fewer than 30 hours a week, a move the company estimates will affect about 2% of its workforce. Here’s a wrap-up of our analysis, along with some additional content about other large companies and how they’re handling rising health care costs.
Randy Hargrove, a Walmart spokesperson, tells EBN that the company's decision to end health coverage for a small portion of its workforce will enable these employees to “decide for themselves what makes the most sense for them.”
Just 25% of companies that offered employee health insurance made coverage available to part-time workers in 2013, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. That percentage will decline further with Walmart Stores Inc.’s announcement that it is dropping health insurance for part-time employees. Walmart joins a growing list of major retailers that have done the same.
Walmart’s announcement this week that it will drop health care coverage for its part-time employees reiterates that employer-sponsored health care coverage is changing, and those benefit advisers who plan to remain relevant to clients must change, too.
Walgreen Co.’s director of health, benefits and wellbeing, Tom Sondergeld, knew his company, like most in the U.S., was on an unsustainable path of increasing health care costs, combined with employees who didn’t focus on their wellbeing. But when the company’s senior directors started thinking about moving employee health care offerings to a private exchange, he was adamantly against it.
Sears Holdings Corp. and Darden Restaurants, Inc. began allowing employees to purchase health insurance through a private insurance exchange in 2013, a move some said would herald a sea change in employer-sponsored health benefits.
