Posts Tagged ‘Utah’

August 17, 2010

Heritage Research

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Utah’s Defined-Contribution Option: Patient-Centered Health Care

In Utah, state policymakers have taken a different approach in health care reform by  giving businesses and their workers the option of “defined contribution” health benefits—where participating workers choose coverage from a wide variety of plans offered by competing insurers through Utah’s health insurance exchange.  In a recent Heritage paper, Gregg Girvan explains how Utah’s state leaders are innovators who are doing precisely what they should be doing.  Click here to read how Utah policymakers are using their authority to resist concentrated power in Washington, and working to provide more and better choices for their citizens.

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August 9, 2010

Health Care News

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What Patient-Centered Health Care Reform Really Looks Like

The Utah State Capitol Building in Salt Lake City

There’s a lot of talk these days about patient-centered health care reform. Before Obamacare, health care revolved around employers, and little has changed since passage of the new law.

This is primarily because of federal policy regarding the tax treatment of employer-sponsored insurance, which was left untouched by the federal overhaul. In recent research, Heritage’s Gregg Girvan explains how this system has led to one-size-fits-all employer-based plans that offer “little or no personal choice; little or no portability of coverage in a rapidly changing economy where workers are changing jobs and careers; and little or no flexibility in tailoring insurance coverage to meet individual and family needs.”

Obamacare moves the focus more towards government than individuals. In contrast, the new patient-centered system Utah is implementing as part of its own health care reform moves employer coverage away from “defined benefits” and towards “defined contribution.” This allows employees to apply their employers’ contribution to a health plan that works best for them. Girvan explains: (more…)

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April 19, 2010

Health Care News

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Outside the Beltway: Utah’s Successes Highlight Federalism’s Benefits

The Utah State Capitol Building in Salt Lake City

In the past year, the Congressional health care battle has usurped much of the public discourse on health care reform. In the mean time, Utah has quietly begun implementing its own version of reform, moving its health care system in a more patient-centered, consumer-driven direction. In a recent paper, Heritage analyst Ed Haislmaier outlines the obstacles Utah has overcome to achieving its objectives of giving “employers, particularly smaller firms, an easier way to offer health benefits to their workers and to provide workers and their families with more coverage choices.”

Haislmaier explains how the Utah reforms are intended to secure the following patient-centered benefits for its residents: (more…)

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August 25, 2009

Heritage Research

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‘Consumer Protections’ Means More Mandates on the Way

Democrats have promised Americans an extensive health insurance benefit package—one as good as that held by members of Congress. They also want to move much of the regulatory power over health insurance markets from the state level, where it currently lies, to the national level.

To see what this would mean in practice, let’s turn to the states. Among the regulations states enact are benefit mandates, which outline the specific treatments that must be covered in all plans offered in a state.

As researchers at the Council for Affordable Health Insurance write:

“While mandates make health insurance more comprehensive, they also make it more expensive because mandates require insurers to pay for care consumers previously funded out of their own pockets. We estimate that mandated benefits currently increase the cost of basic health coverage from a little less than 20% to perhaps 50%…”

The “consumer protection” of a rich benefit package mandated nationwide would actually drive up insurance costs. Moreover, our political system creates pressures for politicians to enact mandates:

“Elected representatives find it difficult to oppose any legislation that promises enhanced care to potentially motivated voters. The sponsors of mandates know this fact of political life…By the late 1960s, state legislatures had passed only a handful of mandated benefits; today, the Council for Affordable Health Insurance (CAHI) has identified 2,133 mandated benefits and providers. And more are on their way.”

It is likely that the federal one-size-fits all benefit package, as proposed in the bills moving through Congress, will end up resembling a state like Massachusetts (with 52 total mandates) rather than one like Utah (with only 23 mandates). The Democrats’ reforms would mean more mandates and higher—not lower—health insurance costs.

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