Home Private Insurance Topics

Private Insurance

New and Noteworthy

Policy Changes Bring Renewed Focus on High-Deductible Health Plans

Policy changes, anticipated increases in premium costs for enrollees, and new standards for health savings accounts may encourage consumers to seek out plans with lower premiums but higher deductibles. This issue brief explores the features of bronze and catastrophic plans, coverage and costs, and the complicated choices consumers face.

Health Insurer Financial Performance in 2024

Examining Short-Term Limited-Duration Health Plans

Health Savings Account Provisions in the 2025 Tax and Spending Law

Consumer Experiences with Health Insurance

Health Care Affordability

BTD Health Policy in 2026

Health Policy in 2026

President and CEO Dr. Drew Altman forecasts eight things to look for in health policy in 2026. “First and foremost,” he writes, “is the role health care affordability will play in the midterms.” And, he notes: “The average cost of a family policy for employers could approach $30,000 and cost sharing and deductibles will rise again after plateauing for several years.”

View all of Drew’s Beyond the Data Columns

Latest News

More KFF Health News

Subscribe to KFF Emails

Choose which emails are best for you.
Sign up here

View the Latest: Private Insurance

Filter

List Grid

541 - 550 of 893 Results

  • Premiums and Worker Contributions Among Workers Covered by Employer-Sponsored Coverage, 1999-2019

    Interactive

    This graphing tool allows users to explore trends in workplace-sponsored health insurance premiums and worker contributions over time for different categories of employers based on results from the annual Employer Health Benefits Survey. Breakouts are available by firm size, region and industry, as well as for firms with relatively few or many part-time workers, higher- or lower-wage workers, and older or younger workers.

  • Private Insurers Are Expected to Pay a Record of At least $1.3 Billion in Rebates to Consumers Beginning in September for Excessive Premiums Relative to Health Care Expenses

    News Release

    Private insurance companies are expecting to pay out a record of at least $1.3 billion in rebates to consumers this fall based on their share of premium revenues devoted to health care expenses in recent years, surpassing the previous record high of $1.1 billion in 2012, according to a new KFF analysis.

  • The ACA is Doing Fine Without a Mandate Penalty

    From Drew Altman

    In an Axios column, Drew Altman explains that the elimination of the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate penalty has had little impact on how the ACA’s insurance markets are working, showing that “the marketplaces continue to function, even when 'severed' from the mandate penalty,” and undercutting a central argument in the lawsuit seeking to strike down the entire law.

  • Self-insured Companies Do No Better on Cost Control

    From Drew Altman

    A data surprise? Drew Altman, in his latest Axios column, shows there is no difference between large self-insured and fully insured companies when it comes to controlling health care costs, bucking conventional wisdom.

  • Benchmark Employer Survey Finds Average Family Premiums Now Top $20,000

    News Release

    Annual family premiums for employer-sponsored health insurance rose 5% to average $20,576 this year, according to the 2019 benchmark KFF Employer Health Benefits Survey released today. Workers’ wages rose 3.4% and inflation rose 2% over the same period. On average, workers this year are contributing $6,015 toward the cost of family coverage, with employers paying the rest.

  • Individual Market Enrollment Ticks Up in Early 2014

    Issue Brief

    This early look at the growth in the individual or nongroup market during the first three months of 2014 uses first quarter enrollment data submitted by insurance companies to state regulators to estimate the size of the market at the end of March. It includes both on and off exchange enrollment and is net of any people leaving the market (whether through plan cancellations or general churn in the market). It does not include the surge of enrollment that occurred toward the end of the open enrollment period as those enrollees most likely began their coverage in April or May.

  • New Analysis Provides Early Look At Increase in Individual Market Enrollees 

    News Release

    A new Kaiser Family Foundation analysis of health insurer reports to state regulators provides a first glimpse of enrollment in the individual, or non-group, insurance market under the Affordable Care Act.  These initial filings reflect enrollment both through the new state insurance marketplaces created under the Affordable Care Act as well as through off-exchange plans.

  • Survey of Health Insurance Marketplace Assister Programs

    Report

    This survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation of Navigators and other Marketplace consumer assistance programs under the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) offers a nationwide analysis of the number and distribution of assisters and people they helped. The report examines the experience of programs in conducting outreach and enrollment assistance during the first open enrollment period. It also reviews the nature of help consumers needed applying for Medicaid or premium tax credits and understanding health insurance choices, and discusses key factors that impacted the effectiveness of Marketplace Assister Programs.

  • Short-Term Limited Duration Plans and HIV

    Issue Brief

    Given the Trump Administration’s promotion of short-term limited-duration (STLD) health insurance policies, this brief examines what they mean for people with HIV. The analysis assesses whether people with HIV could enroll in STLD plans by applying to 38 plans across five states and getting in each case. It also assesses whether such plans could meet basic HIV care and treatment needs for someone diagnosed once enrolled. This finding takes on new importance in light of the Administration’s decision not to defend the ACA and to argue for eliminating pre-existing condition protections.