“If by a "Liberal" they mean someone who looks ahead and not behind, someone who welcomes new ideas without rigid reactions, someone who cares about the welfare of the people-their health, their housing, their schools, their jobs, their civil rights and their civil liberties-someone who believes we can break through the stalemate and suspicions that grip us in our policies abroad, if that is what they mean by a "Liberal", then I'm proud to say I'm a "Liberal.”
John F. Kennedy, Profiles in Courage

Poverty in America

Robert Reich Explains the Economy

Tea Party Pubic Service Announcement

April 19, 2008

Health Care Insecurity Increases as Employer-Based System Continues to Erode

Health insecurity across education levels

It is widely recognized that the employer-based health care system is eroding. The share of workers with employer-provided health insurance has decreased substantially in recent years, even amidst relatively low levels of unemployment and growing productivity. From 2000 to 2006, the share of workers who received health insurance from their own jobs declined 4 percentage points. Perhaps surprisingly, the decline in coverage has taken place across the entire age, education, occupation, industry, race, and ethnicity spectrum. As an example, the chart below shows the decline in employer-provided health insurance between 2000 and 2006 for workers with different levels of education. While workers with more education are more likely to receive health insurance from their employers, workers from all education levels have seen similar declines in coverage. Specifically, workers with no more than a high school education saw a decline of 5.0 percentage points, workers with some college education but no bachelor's degree saw a decline of 4.2 percentage points, and workers with a college degree or more saw a decline of 3.6 percentage points. Overall, 6.4 million fewer workers had employer-provided health insurance in 2006 than in 2000.

These findings, along with others in the Economic Policy Institute paper A Decade of Decline, show that health insecurity is now a broadly shared American experience. The erosion at all levels of the employer-based system, along with the critical need to control skyrocketing health care costs, indicate that the time has come to reform our health care system to guarantee that all Americans have access to affordable, high-quality health insurance. The Health Care for America plan, for example, would ensure that all Americans receive coverage and would do so at a lower total national cost than the current system.

The full report can be viewed at: http://www.epi.org/content.cfm/bp209

No comments: