Voluntary

Arranging and financing long-term care is an issue everyone will face yet no one wants to talk about. However, following the Health Department's move to table the Community Living Assistance Services and Supports Act, planning for long-term care is becoming part of the national conversation - and that presents opportunities and challenges for employers.

As employees take on more responsibility for paying for health care, voluntary benefits can provide much-needed additional coverage. EBN spoke to a number of voluntary benefits providers to get their thoughts on the major trends they see coming in 2012. Not surprisingly, all the trends and influences in the HR world at large - health care reform, employer cost-shifting, technology and communications - affect the voluntary benefits industry as well. Here, we provide a summary of key trends, along with charts and data to help employers plan their voluntary benefits strategy going forward.

Semantics are supremely important in making or breaking certain lines of insurance.

As you consider offering more value-added benefits to your employee population, I encourage you to think about seriously offering long-term care insurance. As many of us are seeing our parents and other family members live well into their 80s and 90s, it's more and more likely that the elderly people in our lives will at some point need long-term care services. It's the rare and fortunate elderly person who continues to live independently in his or her own home without home care services.

With tuition costs on the rise, employees looking for ways to pay for their children's college education can save with 529 plans.

What will the successful post-reform 21st century agency look like? EBA contributor Nelson Griswold predicts what will set you apart from the herd.

New recommendations were released last week on how to better control returning employees to work following disability leaves and absence management. The Disability Management Employers Coalition and Liberty Mutual's best practices result from a series of live and virtual conferences featuring human resource and benefits professionals, representing employers of all sizes and from a range of industries.

While employers have increasingly adopted CDHPs as a lower cost option, employees have been slower to embrace them. A recent study reveals one stat likely to increase participation, writes BeAdvised contributor Doug Mantz.

Last month, a statement from McKinsey Consulting declared that "social innovators are bringing bold new approaches to the difficult problems that plague the world. The next disruptive force in social innovation will involve a new, more rigorous approach that funnels resources to where they can do the most good."

Semantics are supremely important in making or breaking certain lines of insurance.