Employer Reactions to the Affordable Care Act

Although the implementation of parts of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) was delayed until 2015, many firms had already made changes to their health insurance plans and their business practices. This article reports results from a survey administered to western Michigan firms in October 2013 requesting information on any changes they made in response to ACA. The authors found that although 89% of employers planned to offer health insurance in 2014, that number dropped to 66% in 2015. The main ways organizations were controlling health costs were by changing prescription coverage, passing on the costs to employees through higher copays and premiums and offering more high-deductible health plans with health savings accounts. Employers also were altering business practices by decreasing future hiring and decreasing the hours of part-time workers. The authors find that many of these changes were due to the uncertainty firms were facing during the ACA implementation process.