The Reason For Decline In Coverage Rates Of US’s Employer-sponsored Health Insurance From1980s To Present

Employer-sponsored Health Insurance(ESI) is the most important source of healthinsurance for Americans.The growth of ESI in United States was closely related to thesupply and demand condition of medical services and the rapid growth of the healthinsurance industry during the first half of the20th century. But the most important reasonfor the strong link between health benefits and the workplace were the federal government’s price control and labor policies and tax laws during the World War II.However, from1980s to Present, the coverage rates of ESI decreased12.4%.There are many reasons forthis steep drop. Firstly, as health care costs increase, it becomes increasingly difficult foremployers to purchase health plan, more and more employers are cutting down expensesfor ESI. Secondly, ESI’s internal flaws, the unfairly tax treatment and the effect of job lock,also made itself lost many people’s favor. Thirdly, US’s public insurance expansionscrowding out ESI, too. In order to arrest the current trend, several state governments andfederal government chosed employer mandates in their health care reforms. This paperplans to start with the origin and development of ESI, then analyze the main reason for thedecline in coverage rates of ESI from1980s to present, finally make a summary of severalstates and federal government’s measures to deal with this problem. This analysis can helpus understand not only the history and the latest developments of US’s health insurancesystem, but also provides some references for the adjustment of our basic medicalinsurance system for urban employees today.