Health Insurance Articles
Why Family Health Insurance Rates Could Rise In 2012
2011-11-06
Health insurance has been headlining the news on both the state and federal level for months. But as legislatures battle the ethics of different healthcare laws, health insurance rates continue to rise. In fact, each year, family health insurance tends to get more expensive. The year 2012 will most likely be no different. The rise in family health insurance rates next year can be traced back to many factors, but some of the main contributors include politics, economics and the changing scope of medical care.
While most people understand how politics plays a role in the adoption of future healthcare policy, they don't know that political issues will affect the prices of family healthcare in 2012. However, the decisions legislatures make today affect tomorrow's costs. State workers often feel this fastest. In a number of sates, like Boston and Washington, the state has lowered the amount of money it will contribute to its workers' plans as of 2012. The reduced contribution means higher prices for individual state workers' family health insurance. Policies and regulations that make operations more difficult for insurance companies can also cause them to up their rates.
Economic pressure has also resulted in high costs for people seeking family health insurance. According to the New York Times, a family insurance plan now costs around $13,000 per year. In the next 10 years, that number is expected to more than double to $24,000. What this means is that health insurance costs are rising ahead of inflation and wages. As the economy continues to suffer, people continue to lose their jobs and individuals enter the work force at lower starting salaries, a problem begins to occur that is worse than an increase in health insurance rates. The gap between what people are able to afford and how much insurance costs widens, making more and more people simply unable to buy insurance.
Finally, insurance costs will likely continue to rise in 2012 because medical care is changing, more people are using it and, therefore, it is becoming more expensive. Doctors are now using more advanced techniques to treat diseases, and these techniques and the equipment they require are more expensive. Further, more people, especially baby boomers, are using their insurance plans to get medical care. These increased costs are spread out so that they affect every consumer.
Many states are already predicting a rise in family health insurance for 2012, and these rises have nothing to do with an individual's health record. They result from political, economic and medical concerns. Families cannot avoid rising rates overall, but they can make sure they get good rates by shopping around.
