Employment Benefits

The article, “Employment-Based Health Benefits” focuses on health care benefits, and their transformation overtime. It describes changing health care decisions due to the flexibility associated with some health care plans such as CDHP. Moreover, the article highlights a declining trend concerning the number of employers offering health care benefits due to aspects of rising costs. The article presents the author’s position about the factors relating to the changing trend in employment-based health benefits, which he asserts to be under the influence of Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) and GAAP. The author also views the current trend in CDHP as a factor resulting from the failure by employees to undertake preventive healthcare. In addition, Paul asserts that the current trend concerning employees’ benefits, and costs associated with financial reports may promote employers to terminate employment-based health benefits.

The author’s assertions concerning the increasing freedom by employees on healthcare decisions due to the adoption of CDHP are substantial. CDHP health-care plan gives patients significant levels of control over their own health care costs. Statistics on the current health-care costs indicate a rising trend in the cost of health care as highlighted by increasing spending in health insurance and health care. Between 2010 and 2011 individual health-care spending rose from 3.8 to 4.6 percent. This amounted to an estimate expenditure of 4,500 dollars on health care per person. Analysts expect the trend to retain an upwards motion, and may reach an estimated spending of 32,175 dollars in 2021 for a family policy (Young, 2011). In response, employers are likely to embark on various cost-control exercises especially concerning long-term healthcare. While FASB and GAAP create a framework upon which organizations base the planning of healthcare benefits, these standards have undergone minimal changes since their establishment. Thus, their influence upon the trend of health-care costs in minimal. The solution to the observed trend in health care is the adoption of appropriate reforms to facilitate affordable and reliable health care.