NU Online News Service, July 16, 2003, 5:50 p.m. EDT – A new chart book from the Health Insurance Association of America, Washington, gives some figures that help explain why employers have been trying to shift more of the health care cost burden to employees.
"The employee's out-of-pocket spending for health care services is near a historic low point," the HIAA says in an introduction to a graph that shows employees' out-of-pocket health care spending as a percentage of total health care spending from 1970 to 2001.
The percentage fell below 15% in 2001, from close to 35% in 1970, according to statistics that HIAA obtained from the National Health Statistics Group, an arm of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
