By Sylvia Hall
Posted by Sylvia Reports by Sylvia Hall on October 14, 2010

When it comes to health care costs, Roy Berlin is in a quandary. Over the past 10 years, the cost of providing health insurance to his workers has doubled. But as president of the family-owned Berlin Metals in Hammond, Ind., he is determined to pay the majority share of health insurance costs for his 65 employees even though the bill now totals more than the rent for his company’s building. Covered by the same plan, Berlin is deeply troubled by the upward trend.

“All I can tell you is that the way we’re headed right now is unaffordable for people, unaffordable for business and unaffordable for companies,” Berlin said. “I can say that in 10 years that we won’t be able to pay the same plan that we have today.”

Berlin’s story is a refrain heard across the nation as more and more Americans find themselves paying massive bills for basic insurance coverage-- or not able to afford it at all. The number of Americans carrying health insurance decreased in 2009 for the first time since 1987 when the government began tracking health insurance data, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

The struggle to pay health-related bills will likely get harder before it gets easier, if the projections from the Lincolnshire-based benefit consulting firm Hewitt Associates LLC, come to pass. The firm estimates health insurance premiums will rise by nearly 9 percent in 2011, in a trend Hewitt analysts expect to continue for several years.

Insurance companies say the solution to the problem isn’t easy and doesn’t lie solely in their hands. Scot Roskelley, a representative for health insurance giant Aetna Inc., said insurance costs closely mirror the price of actual care.

By Kevin McKeough

Posted on Chicago Business powered by Crain’s on March 21, 2011

In 1999, Ron Cowgill was paying $9,643 a year for health benefits for the six people working at his Glenview home-remodeling business, D/R Services Unlimited Inc., plus two children. By 2010, the insurance was covering five people and one child, but his costs had risen to $78,000, in large part because two employees had serious medical problems.

Unable to find less expensive coverage, Mr. Cowgill eliminated the health benefit. The move helped him stay in business despite a drop in revenue to $800,000 last year from $2.4 million in 2009. It also allowed the two employees with problematic medical histories to enroll in the Illinois Comprehensive Health Insurance Plan, a state program for people with pre-existing medical conditions that isn't available to those with employer-provided health benefits.

“Just dropping the two people with pre-existing conditions would have lowered our premium, but I couldn't do it,” Mr. Cowgill says. “Before I canceled it, I researched it and made sure they had a place to go.”

Even for small businesses with healthy employees, the cost of health benefits has been a major hurdle. On average, businesses with 200 or fewer employees pay 18% more for the same health insurance than larger employers, according to the University of Chicago's National Opinion Research Center.

In 2008, monthly small-group health insurance premiums in Illinois averaged $393 for individuals and $1,035 for a family, according to a study by America's Health Insurance Plans, a national association in Washington, D.C. Those costs in part reflect consolidation in the market: Six insurers provide nearly 85% of the health insurance in the state, according to Michael McRaith, director of the Illinois Department of Insurance.