Healthcare

A new ADP survey shows a wide gap between the goals and reality of how employees understand their benefit plans. Eighty percent of human resources decision-makers believe it's important for employees to fully understand their benefit options, yet they estimate only about 60% of their own employees do – a finding with serious implications for how companies communicate one of the most important parts of their employees' total compensation.

Workers in the U.K. and Poland have the most generous statutory employee holiday entitlements while employees in the U.S., Canada, Philippines, China and Thailand have the least generous entitlements, according to an overview of employee regulation and employment practices released by Mercer.

Americans' trademark optimism is intact, at least in regard to retirement, despite the economic turbulence that is reportedly forcing many people to work longer and make do with less. In fact, many retirees found only one downside.

The Supreme Court last week set the schedule for briefs to be filed ahead of hearing arguments in late March over President Obama's sweeping health care overhaul law.

Not only are older American workers (age 50 and over) expecting to work longer, but many now say they expect to never retire, according to the nonpartisan Employee Benefit Research Institute. Data suggest the trend may be tied to the recent economic recession.

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.

Televising U.S. Supreme Court proceedings would benefit the public, some said at a Senate hearing on Tuesday, while others called the idea possibly unconstitutional and a potentially harmful influence.

Mayo Clinic researchers have amassed additional evidence that secondhand smoke kills and smoke-free workplace laws save lives.

The Essential Health Benefits Coalition has backed recommendations made by the Institute of Medicine to the Department of Health and Human Services' on an essential health benefits package.

After decades in relative obscurity, a legal doctrine that holds corporate officers liable for company wrongdoing is finding its way back into some high-profile health care prosecutions.