Open Enrollment: Weighing Health Insurance Coverage vs. Cost
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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Here's your Money Briefing for Thursday, November 4th. I'm J.R.
Why is open enrollment more important this year and who should pay closer attention?
Whalen for The Wall Street Journal. For millions of Americans, November means open enrollment for company-provided health insurance when workers choose or change the health benefits package they'll have next year. Now, it can be easy to glaze over the pages and pages of options and just select the same benefits from last year. But this time around, that could be a mistake.
The pandemic, people are still dealing with health issues. You might have hospital bills or needing time off. And there's also the fact that there's just different types of workplace benefits now, too, that you might not be aware of.
That's our personal finance reporter, J.J. McCorvey. Coming up, we'll talk with him about balancing coverage and costs and how open enrollment can help you build long-term savings. That's after the break.
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How are employers changing benefits during the Great Resignation and pandemic?
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For many Americans, it's time to select the health benefits you'll get through your employer next year. But as healthcare costs and broader inflation take a bigger bite out of our paychecks, how should we approach picking the right benefits package for 2022? WSJ personal finance reporter J.J. McCorvey has been checking in with benefits experts and financial planners about that, and he joins me now. J.J., thanks for taking the time to chat.
Thanks for having me, J.R.
So, J.J., why should people pay closer attention to benefits options this year?
For one, benefits are being offered more competitively right now.
How can you balance health insurance coverage versus out‑of‑pocket cost for 2022?
People have called this current period the Great Resignation. A lot of Americans have been resigning from their jobs and looking for better ones or ones that are more flexible to their needs. According to my sources, employers have been more competitive in what they offer their employees to stay to keep that retention. There's other reasons, too. Other things at play, obviously, are, you know, the pandemic. People are still sick. dealing with health issues. You might have hospital bills or needing time off. And there's also the fact that there's just different types of workplace benefits now, too, that you might not be aware of. And so it would not benefit you to look at this as just a regular open enrollment season.
Yeah, I want to get to some of those other types of benefits in a moment. But, you know, medical insurance is the big one with health care costs going up. So how can people balance coverage versus cost?
Yeah. So the financial experts I talked to said to really try to pull in your budget into your benefits. And basically, that just means not selecting benefits this open enrollment season in a vacuum, you know, without your budget and medical expenses in mind. A lot of insurance providers offer a medical expense calculator so you can look at what you spent on medical bills the past year, project what you might spend in the next year, and then calculate that and see, you know, what type of plan is best for you. So you might, for example, if you expect to have more medical procedures or services done in 2022, you might opt for a low deductible plan.
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Chapters
7 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:00–0:39
2
Why is open enrollment more important this year and who should pay closer attention?
0:39–1:27
3
How are employers changing benefits during the Great Resignation and pandemic?
1:27–2:30
4
How can you balance health insurance coverage versus out‑of‑pocket cost for 2022?
2:30–4:18
5
What tools and calculations help decide between high‑deductible and low‑deductible plans?
4:18–5:23
6
What are Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) and how have contribution limits changed this year?
5:23–7:49
7
Which emerging workplace benefits (like pet, mental‑health, and financial wellness) should employees watch for?
7:49–9:10
Speakers
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