The impact of High-Deductible Health Plans - Essay Example

Your savings will show an upward turn until you need them for the real-life situation when you are sick and pay from your account the deductible and its associated costs. These plans have been offered in both -- employer-sponsored health insurance as well as personal health insurance. Those who favor these plans have their arguments of doing smart shopping – buying a product that you actually need, which not only makes you aware of cost-benefit but also cuts on prices as pressure on prices decreases.

Actually, these high-deductible health plans are going to create consciousness among consumers, as it is clear from the study undertaken by Watson Wyatt Worldwide, which states that 72 percent of workers and their families use only 11 percent expenditure sponsored by employer health-care while on the other hand, merely 4 percent spend 49 percent of their employer’s cost on medical expenses. Quite strange, isn’t it? Ted Nussbaum, Watson Wyatt’s director has analyzed this development in the perspective of overall costs, which would be affected minimum because the ¾ percent of the population will curb its healthcare spending due to occurring economic benefits but deduction of $1,000 or $2,000 on that 4 percent category of “really sick people” won’t change their nature of spending and controlling on medical expenses.

So overall costs are not going to bring any change in yearly outcomes. As Nussbaum concludes “in and by themselves, the high-deductible health plans have a zero impact on health-care [cost] trends. Clearly, if you ask people to pay more money, you will get a one-time reduction in the base cost. But they have a zero impact on annual trends." On the other hand, Merrill Matthews Jr., director of the Council for Affordable Health Insurance, disagrees with Nussbaum on some of his findings on “really sick people” who have huge claims over their high deductible policies, actually as Mathews comments, "move back into the same old insulation from cost".