Posted on 08/16/2015 12:25:25 PM PDT by Brad from Tennessee
To avoid the Affordable Care Act’s so-called “Cadillac tax” on rich benefit plans, companies are adding surcharges of $100 a month or more to wives and husbands of workers, hoping spouses will seek coverage elsewhere, new employer data shows.
The Cadillac tax was created as part of the Affordable Care Act largely as a way to help subsidize benefits to the uninsured under the law. Starting in 2018, employers pay a 40 percent tax on costs of health plans that are above $10,200 per individual and $27,500 for family coverage.
The idea behind the so-called “spousal surcharge” employers are implementing is to reduce the number of people an employer covers so the company can save money and avoid triggering the special excise tax for plans with high cost benefits.
“The spousal cost is wrapped into that $27,500,” Brian Marcotte, president and CEO of National Business Group on Health said in an interview last week. “If spouses have coverage elsewhere, the surcharge will get them to move to that other employer’s plan.”
(Excerpt) Read more at forbes.com ...
An HR manager told me back before O-care became the law that the company had decided to drop all insurance and put everybody on the new plan. Then, Obama came down on them and other companies hard, making it politically impossible to drop company insurance. But as soon as they can, you can be certain they’ll drop all coverage. (They’re a Fortune 500 defense contractor.)
The cost of insurance matters. But it will never be fixed as long as the cost of care is crazy high and hidden from and detached from the person receiving care.
Good thing I don’t have a spouse. Or Obamacare.
No problem, but no wonder I don’t feel that much richer with the $2500 a near I’ve saved so far, it’s only half that. And that’s after all the stupid hoops and stunts I have to jump through at work in order to meet their “health goals”.
Do I need to add </barfsarc> ?
You know, I tell young people at work that when I first was married, my wife and I insured each other, there was no coordination of benefits, and I could have had a heart-lung transplant and only paid for phone calls.
And the evil genius of this is, that things will get worse and worse every year. Somehow they “forgot” to consider inflation, which, is just about as certain as the sun rising tomorrow. So, the trigger point is lower and lower.
I can see employers dropping spousal coverage. I know it has been discussed in our company.
While you can state with certainty that you don’t share a bed with a spouse, I don’t think you can state that about Obamacare. O-care is pernicious and you don’t have to buy from an exchange to end up being affected in some way.
You know, I tell young people at work that when I first was married, my wife and I insured each other, there was no coordination of benefits, and I could have had a heart-lung transplant and only paid for phone calls.
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I had employer provided insurance in the early 70s (still do) I had to pay a dollar a day if I wanted T.V. in my room. 21 days, $21.
You had to tell them at check in whether you wanted a smoking or non smoking room. Oh yeah, I believe I did have to pay for phone calls too. Everything else was paid by 100% premium free, employer provided insurance.
Ah, those were the “good old days”.
Too bad for you than public employees and their health care plans will be affected by the Cadillac tax on their very generous benefits. Public employers will have only two options: either reduce health care benefits for their public workers or pass the cost of the federal tax to local taxpayers. What do you think will happen? Get ready for a tax increase.
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