Survey: Employers will not change health coverage because of new law

The national health care law will not change how the vast majority of employers provide health care for their workers, according to a recent survey of benefit plan administrators and trustees. In the 2012 Post-Election Survey, conducted by the International Foundation of Employee Benefit Plans (IFEBP), eighty-four percent of U.S. employers said they are very likely or definitely will continue to provide their own health care coverage to full-time employees after the new law goes into full effect in 2014.

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) calls for setting up state-based health care exchanges in 2014. The exchanges are designed to help individuals and small businesses pool together to purchase health insurance.

Critics of the health care law say it will spur employers to drop insurance coverage and instead dump employees into the state exchanges. But only one percent of employers surveyed by IFEBP said they definitely will not provide employee health care coverage in 2014.

About 25 percent of respondents say they are likely to direct only some employees to the exchanges while continuing to provide coverage for others, as opposed to dropping coverage for all employees. Sixty-three percent of organizations say they will most likely provide a subsidy to employees that are shifted to the exchanges.

Most employers also are not dramatically adjusting hiring plans based on the ACA. Forty-eight percent say they have no plans to add or reduce workforce in the next two years. Eleven percent say they will reduce workforce due to costs associated with the ACA, while 5 percent say they will reduce hiring to stay under the 50-employee ACA threshold.

The survey was conducted December 3-4. It includes both private and public employers.