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February 15, 2007
Are Health Savings Accounts Gaining Traction?
David Gratzer, a physician and senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, writes in a guest commentary in the Wall Street Journal that, despite "critical" reports, Health Savings Accounts, introduced three years ago, are quietly gaining traction.
Health Savings Accounts, "which marry low-cost, high-deductible health insurance policies with pre-tax accounts" to pay for health care, have fallen on deaf Democrat ears in Washington, Gratzer writes. Why are Democrats uninterested in Health Savings Accounts?
This is partly due to a "slew" of reports that have dismissed Health Savings Accounts as "unpopular and harmful." But the reality is different from the one reflected in those reports, says Gratzer.
According to estimates, enrollment in HSA-type plans "more than doubled since January 2006," and now 13.4 million Americans are enrolled in them. Insurance company CIGNA reports that customers with an HSA incur costs that are 16 percent lower than enrollees in traditional plans.
A Kaiser Family Foundation survey finds that 71 percent of those with an HSA plan consider cost when choosing a plan, compared to 49 percent of those with "more traditional employer-sponsored coverage." Still, HSAs "can seem initially complicated," Gratzer admits, but he says that as more people enroll in them, the general public will understand them better and will be more likely to enroll in them.
Learn more about what a Health Savings Account plan can do for you today at: http://www.health--savings--accounts.com
Posted by Wiley Long at February 15, 2007 09:10 AM