Trends in Employee Wage and Health Insurance Compensation for Employer-Sponsored Health Insurance (ESI) Coverage

Health insurance coverage continues to be an important benefit of employment and employer-sponsored insurance is the most prominent form of health coverage in the US. We examine trends in both employer and employee contributions to the costs of health insurance premium between 2002 and 2005 and assess these contributions relative to changes in worker wages. We do this for the US overall and for the 50 states plus the District of Columbia. We found a significant increase of 15.5% in the share of total compensation going toward health benefits (from 12.3-14.2%) for workers with individual coverage and an increase of 13.5% (from 20.6-23.4%) for workers with family coverage. Wages over this time period decreased 3.0% for workers with individual coverage and increased 0.8% for workers with family coverage.