https://www.kff.org/health-costs/report/2019-employer-health-benefits-survey/
Family health insurance now costs $20k per year, based on a survey of employers. Most of that cost is paid by employers, but employees pay about $6k of it (not including copayments and deductibles, which have been getting larger).
For just an employee, costs are about $7k, with the employee paying $1k.
This isn’t news. It’s been true for our family for several years now. And we buy the CHEAPEST plan possible.
“Most of that cost is paid by employers…”
Is that true, eh? I bet most of us here would love to see such an employer. 
I own my own business so I am the employer and employee and yes it sucks to pay for insurance. Both kids in college are on their schools plans which are actually really good plans. Too bad they can’t stay on those longer then 4 years and for the price they pay.
“Both kids in college are on their schools plans which are actually really good plans. Too bad they can’t stay on those longer then 4 years and for the price they pay.”
Really? At my kid’s school, the plan costs $3,260 a year, plus a $900 mandatory health services fee, which strikes me as an exorbitant amount of money to insure an 18 year old kid who is on campus less than 9 months a year. Luckily, we can opt out because he is covered under my employer’s plan (still have to pay the health services fee, which is no big deal).
I believe we paid under $2K for a decent plan for S. We also had to pay some fee toward the on campus student health center.
We were able to opt out for all but the year S was aging off the family plan, when he was turning 22. We never filed any claims, so no idea how that would have gone but it was convenient to have without searching for something that would cover him after he aged out.
The plans vary a lot by school—what they cost, what they cover, requirements for opting out, geographic restrictions, etc.
That does sound expensive, since $4,160 over 9 months is like $5,546 yearly, which is close to the overall employer plan average for just employees without spouse or family coverage (about $7k). https://healthcostinstitute.org/research/annual-reports/entry/health-care-costs-from-birth-to-death suggests that people of typical college student age should cost about half as much as the overall average in commercial health insurance (non Medicare). Perhaps the school is in an area with expensive health care, or has a student population with higher health care costs than typical, or has a plan with very low deductibles?
This might be area dependent. Around here most employers carry the brunt of the insurance cost. The full cost of my Parent + Children plan is 13K/year, but work pays over 9K of that.
My daughter’s college plan was originally $1800 per year but they lowered it to $1200 because there weren’t many claims (so they had to refund some premiums). It paid for a few things while she was in school but we didn’t put it to the test.
It lasted the full year. Daughter even had a some appointments in the summer after she graduated and her current insurance billed the school’s insurance and it paid the majority of the claim, which was more than the premium she had paid that year.
My other daughter went to the emergency room while on vacation and didn’t have her insurance card with her. $18,000! EIGHTEEN THOUSAND DOLLARS for about 2 hours in the ER and it was a kidney infection, they gave her some antibiotics and sent her away. The hospital immediately reduced its part of the bill by $8000 (do you think they know they are overbilling?) when they thought she was going to pay OOP, but I don’t know if the insurance company received that same discount.
That is OUTRAGEOUS.
ucbalumnus:
He’s in the Boston area - at Tufts. Just took a look at some other Boston schools, and those rates look to be par for the course. Looks like Harvard is the most expensive of all at $3,700 plus a mandatory health center fee of $1,206. Apparently, Massachusetts law requires students be covered under a school health plan if they are not covered under their parents/guardian’s plan. Other states probably have similar laws. Tuft’s website says you can apply for financial aid if you can’t afford to pay for coverage.
Fees are like $1600/year with $200 deductible… Blue cross ppo. Same for my daughter. It lowered what we pay for 2 people VA family plan
@HImom — how can your son be aging out of your plan at 22? ACA mandates that plans that offer dependent coverage offer it to adult children till age 26. Although the law refers to “dependent “ adult children, it specifies that coverage must be offered regardless of financial dependency, residency, student status, employment status, or marital status.
It would be helpful to indicate how long ago this was. I know from other posts that @HImom’s son has been out of college for awhile.
Costs of college health plans (which are for 12 months actually) have gone up considerably in the past few years. My youngest graduated last year so I’ve been seeing the prices for about 7 years now between 2 kids (and opting out) and have seen prices almost double.
For those of you claiming your employers aren’t paying the bulk of your coverage, how much do you pay per month and do you know the true cost of insurance without the employer subsidy? If not, you might be shocked at how expensive it really is.
My son also aged out of our family plan at age 22…because he aged out before the ACA was passed.
When my son was in college (he’s now 31, HS class of 2006), the ACA had not been passed yet. So he had to be a full time college student to stay on our employer based insurance. I remember that I wasn’t sure when he was on a co op if he would be able to stay on our insurance. The school charged us a co op fee (I think it was like 1 credit) and he was considered to be a full time student and could stay on our insurance.
As I remember, he was the first to have the choice to stay on our insurance until 26 as we had a friend who was a year older and her parents were thrilled that they could add her back to her insurance.
Honestly, I don’t think that the prices quoted above for student health insurance seem that expensive. For those who don’t have access to employer based health insurance.
I do remember we had to submit a form to my D’s school that she had health insurance and that it would be accepted in the state she was going to school in. I remember we picked a different plan that covered the area she was in.
I think @HImom S is around my S’s age.
TBH, the age of having to worry about my kid being in college full time seems almost as foreign as not having a cell phone
$18k is presumably an inflated list price used as a starting point to negotiate with insurance companies, each of which may have a lower negotiated price.
Yes, S aged out just before ACA passed, so we bought the university plan for his SR year and then had to buy a monthly plan from when it ran our in Aug until Jan when he was covered again because ACA passed.
It was over a decade ago.
Yes, but those with no insurance, or insurance that isn’t accepted through that hospital, get billed $18k. They have no power to negotiate prices or to take advantage of group discounts. They are standing there needing medical help and have to pay the rack rate.
A friend had a baby (so she was up on what was covered and which hospitals to use) and 2 days later had to be rushed to the hospital for gall bladder surgery. Turns out the surgeon (middle of the night, not a lot of choices) was not in her plan. She now owes $10k for the surgeon. The hospital was in-network but not the surgeon. That’s ridiculous.
@twoinanddone — there is some effort to get legislation to avoid the type of situation you are describing. I have heard some states (not HI) have laws protecting patients in these situations.
When our S was having a test performed that required him to go to a hospital and have anesthesia, he was duly sent to an in network hospital with an in network surgeon BUT an out of network anesthesiologist (unknown to us—no in network pediatric anesthesiologists in the city of Denver)! I fought my insurer and ultimately they paid the bill for everything, including the out of network anesthesiologist.
Honestly, is the patient or his/her rep supposed to ask everyone whether they are or are not in network?!?! How does that work with a child? An emergency? At what point is the onus somewhere other than on the patient?!?!