Small-Group Market Weathers COVID, but Other Threats Loom

Although the health insurance market catering to small businesses has largely remained stable amid the disruption of the COVID-19 pandemic, some health policy experts say there are reasons to be concerned about the market’s future. One recent threat is the surging popularity of so-called level-funded health plans, according to a new report produced by researchers at Georgetown University’s Center on Health Insurance Reforms (CHIR) and the Urban Institute.

“I hope with our report that there’s more awareness that this is an emerging issue,” Megan Houston, a research fellow at CHIR, tells AIS Health, a division of MMIT. “The small-group market is not as discussed as it should be given the issues that they are facing.”

To produce the report, Houston and her co-authors interviewed health insurers, brokers and members of the small business community in six states: Arkansas, Minnesota, Montana, New Mexico, Pennsylvania and Vermont. One key finding, their report says, is that “many small employers are shifting to coverage exempt from Affordable Care Act rules in response to rising costs, resulting in an unsettled market.”

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Leslie Small

Leslie Small

Leslie has been working in journalism since 2009 and reporting on the health care industry since 2014. She has covered the many ups and downs of the Affordable Care Act exchanges, the failed health insurer mega-mergers, and hundreds of other storylines spanning subjects such as Medicaid managed care, Medicare Advantage, employer-sponsored insurance, and prescription drug coverage. As the managing editor of Health Plan Weekly and Radar on Drug Benefits, she writes and edits for both publications while overseeing a small team of reporters who also focus on the managed care sector. Before joining AIS Health, she was a senior editor for the e-newsletter Fierce Health Payer, and she started her career as a copy editor at multiple local newspapers. She graduated with a dual degree in journalism and political science from Penn State University.

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