MANAGED CARE October 2010. ©MediMedia USA
The number of Americans with employer-based health insurance fell by more than 2 percentage points last year, says a new analysis from the Employee Benefit Research Institute.
About 61 percent of people age 65 and under had insurance benefits through their employers in 2008, compared with 59 percent in 2009 — the lowest level in the 15-year period (ending in 2009) that the study examined.
Conversely, those in this age group who did not have any health insurance increased to 18.9 percent in 2009, up from 17.4 percent in 2008.
Not surprisingly, the biggest contributor to this downward slide is the recession.
“Job losses and the slow economic recovery result in fewer workers being eligible for health insurance coverage,” says Paul Fronstin, author of the report and senior research associate at the institute.