That’s less than the medicare premiums are going up
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Is that for the employer + employee cost, or just the employee cost?
Employee cost
And this is why it’s nice to work for a company that provides benefits.
It’s the folks on ACA plans that really are getting cost increases this year.
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I looked into this too and at my local public one has to be enrolled in a degree seeking program to qualify for student insurance.
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Because I was curious, I looked into 2 colleges close to me. One doesn’t supply insurance but you have to have it. The other you need to be taking 6 credits and student plus dependents can get it. I think I used the college insurance when I was there decades ago.
I applaud anyone who has looked in to ways like signing up for classes to beat the high cost of insurance. I do not applaud the situation our country is in that this is what working people have to do to try and stay above water or just not pay outrageous fees. 
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A friend was vulnerable and posted on FB about her family’s insurance issues. I suggested the college thing to her. I haven’t looked into it locally myself.
Just because I hadn’t seen this before today and because it just was “approved” Nov. 14 according to my search, sharing here in case others are interested:
“The 2026 Medicare Part B price was officially determined and announced on
November 14, 2025, by the**Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS)**. The standard premium was set at $202.90 per month, a $17.90 increase from the 2025 premium”
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I’m interested in how much private insurance has risen in the same period that ACA premiums have gone up 2X, 3X,4X. The Biden bill was to cover increases for a set period, but did the insurers just keep raising the prices only on the ACA policies? Why aren’t private employers who provide health insurance screaming that their costs have doubled or tripled? They can’t all be passing those costs on to their employees, and if they aren’t passing them on, how are they recouping them? Lower raises and bonuses? Reduced coverage for their insurance?
IMO, insurers kept raising the prices of ACA policies over the last 4 years because they could and the government was covering the increases. Will it be a lose/lose situation where many people lose insurance because they can’t afford the premiums but the insurance companies lose income because so many people just can’t afford the costs.
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Spousal Unit’s employer’s health insurance is changing for 2026 and this will make it $87/mo cheaper for us to have just him on his employer’s health insurance with the kids and I remaining on mine. So we will be switching his medical plan for next year.
My costs haven’t doubled or tripled, but they have gone up quite a bit. My company pays a set amount each month towards insurance. Any cost above that amount is paid by the employee. My employer has nominally raised their contribution this year (that’s all they can afford to do), so my out of pocket costs for premiums will go up quite a bit.
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My employee based insurance has gone up 30% for the employer. I don’t know yet how much of that increase will be placed on employees- there is a formula that the state follows.
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I worked for a boutique employee benefits consultant in the early 2010’s, actually during the time that the ACA was passed. I can tell you unequivocally that employers were complaining then that costs were out of control, and they were trying hard not to pass the full cost increases on to the employees. Employers are still complaining about the high costs and the price increases … but honestly, who is listening? The health insurance companies have very powerful lobbies.
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Aren’t the ACA policies required to spend 85% of premiums on actual medical/health expenses? (15% doesn’t go very far when it has to cover G&A, Marketing and Sales, and profits). And, of course, those premiums are local and state approved. (yeah, some states are more rigorous in reviewing premium increases than others, but then that’s an individual state issue if they decide to not regulate much)
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Many large companies self insure.
A large corporation that employs many young healthy employees will not have as big of a burden as an ACA plan that will have older and sicker people on their plans.
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And some larger employers are self insured, but also old and sick, so our costs are higher! Until Covid, we always had open house meetings where they went over all sorts of things to tell us WHY things were changing and all the different things they tried to keep our costs down. At some point - 2010ish? - the average age of our employee was 54! We are now down to 45. That probably helps us some.
I listed somewhere what my employer pays vs me. Our company is still very open about how much they pay, but I won’t know their new rates until my first paycheck next year. I do know in ‘97 when I started, the big thing was that we split the costs 50-50. Somewhere along the way - to help compensate over many (many!) years of zero raises (cost of living and within our pay scale) they started to increase their contribution. They are now pushing 80%!!! I’d hate for it to go back to 50!
A couple of other notes… when ACA was first enacted, our rates went up 12%, but they were quick to tell us it wasn’t the ACA doing all of that. The ACA requirements contributed to 4% of the increased and our usage 8%.
It used to be that everyone on the ACA was required to have health care, or pay the penalty - thus the young and health helped pay for the older and sicker. That’s not the case anymore.
I read in an article in the last month, but don’t remember where, that said people on the ACA go to the ER at something like 2-3x more often than people not on ACA plans. I thought that was interesting.
I had one more thing, but my H interrupted me and now I forget lol.
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Over the last few years my employer provided healthcare as changed in different ways. For almost 30 years I paid $0.00 weekly and my OOP was capped at $1,500(employer would cover the difference). Two years ago my OOP went up to $2,500 but coverage was still free. Last year was when the plans themselves started to change. They started offering an HSA plan, and my plan, but no one new could enroll in my plan. My plan also started to cost me $53 each week for coverage, BUT the whole family got these debit cards that would cover 100% of your medication costs. That was a win for me. I take 5 different meds a day, and 2 are quite expensive . I saved money on that plan. This year they discontinued my plan, so everyone went on the HSA. The cost of the plan is $24.11 a week. My OOP is now capped at $5,000 by the company.
As I mentioned above, the total cost (employer + employee) for next year workplace provided insurance where I work seems to be going up 5-10%. This is greater than general CPI inflation.
However, ACA markets may have limited competition (how many people here are seeing monopoly or duopoly situations in their area?). In addition, increasing prices may drive away some healthier people who feel that they cannot afford it, leaving only the sicker more expensive people buying insurance (unlike workplace insurance that covers the healthy as well as the sick).
I have a friend who owns a small company with about 10-12 employees. He definitely complains that health insurance is his biggest expenditure after salaries – the amount the company has to pay is absurd. But he says that he can’t pass the costs along to his employees, because he knows they can’t afford it.
I don’t know any specifics of how much he pays or for what kind of insurance specifically – but I get the sense no one is winning except health insurance companies.
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