The Mercer study also revealed health care reform provisions that concern employers the most. Here are a couple of the areas of concern:
Dependent care coverage. Beginning September 23, 2010, all organizations must extend dependent coverage to all dependent children—even married ones—up to, and including, age 26. Most employers will need to change their dependent eligibility rules to comply with the reform law.
- Providing coverage to more part-time workers. The reform law will require employers to offer “affordable” health care coverage to all employees who average 30 hours per week or more in a month—starting in 2014. This provision will especially impact organizations that heavily rely on part-time labor at the 30 or more hours a week level.
Most surveys of workers show that benefits are second in importance only to job security. The importance of compensation usually ranks last or nearly so.
So, if benefits are so important, why do employers considering cutting benefits as one of the first cost-saving options? As long as employer-provided health insurance is tax-free, why not maximize the tax-free benefit and make other adjustments to balance the budget!
Consider offsetting the coming increases in health care costs with employee engagement, motivation and efficiency. Even after making recession-related adjustments, most organizations have many ways to increase efficiencies and reduce costs by focusing on issues that are really important.
[1] http://www.mercer.com/summary.htm?idContent=1380755