Employer Strategies

Americans are again taking advantage of health savings accounts and health reimbursement arrangements. According to new research, average account balances across the nation in 2012 were up 4% from the year before.

Doctors are increasingly taking on more patients to compensate for cuts in payments from health insurers, researchers say, and PPACA is expected to increase the volume.

A small survey from the Midwest Group on Health indicates that, while further conversation is needed, awareness of the challenges surrounding specialty pharmacy is increasing.

Ninety-eight percent of American businesses have fewer than 100 employees and, according to new numbers from LIMRA, the number of small employers offering benefits is at its lowest level in 20 years.

Oklahoma opposed a request by the U.S. that a judge dismiss the state’s lawsuit challenging President Obama’s 2010 health-care reform legislation.

Tax the rich! Raise their rates! Limit their deductions! That seems to be the populist mantra. It’s perpetuated in the press, and there’s some indication that the general public seems to support the idea. Now middle class workers with higher than average incomes seem to be caught up in discussions defining those that are “rich,” says EBA Blogger and The Principal Financial Group’s tax-exempt national practice leader.

“Being able to afford health care and the support I need in my old age,” had 26% of respondents “highly worried,” the most common response in a new survey from UBS Wealth Management Americas.

State exchanges top Americans’ wish list for what they would like the government to set as 2013 health care priorities.

Howard County, Md., will become the first municipality to establish a nonprofit, member-run health co-op to sell individual and small group plans through the insurance exchanges — a move some say could undercut competitors by 30%.

UnitedHealth Group Inc. and other U.S. health insurers will soon have company in Maryland: a nonprofit started by a county government that plans to sell coverage at rates as much as 30% lower than competitors.