Fewer Washington employers offering health insurance - Feb. 12, 2007

07-010

Media contacts: Rick Lockhart, 360-438-3155
Sheryl Hutchison, 360-902-9289

OLYMPIA – For the second year in a row, the number of Washington employers offering health insurance declined, according to the results of a 2006 benefits survey released today by the state Employment Security Department.  

The percentage of employers offering health benefits to full-time workers declined from 67.8 percent in 2004 to 67.1 percent in 2005 and to 66.4 percent in 2006, a two-year decline of 1.4 percentage points. 

Health-insurance offerings to part-time workers had a slightly smaller decline, from 15.1 percent in 2004 and 2005 to 14.2 percent in 2006, a two-year decline of 0.9 percentage points.

In general, industries that paid higher wages were more likely to offer health benefits. At the same time, the study found that industries with higher-percentage wage increases in 2006 also showed the largest decreases in benefit offerings.

The study did not produce clear data about the reasons for the decline. But the report notes that employers may have offset rising health-insurance premiums and rising worker wages with reduced benefit offerings.

The study also found that there was a small shift toward merging paid vacation and sick leave into general paid time off.  General paid time off increased by 2 percent, while paid vacation and sick leave each declined by 1 percent. 

In addition, about 42 percent of all employers offered some type of retirement plan, with large companies being far more likely to offer a plan than smaller firms. Of companies with 500 or more workers, 97 percent offered retirement, compared to just 33 percent of businesses with fewer than 10 workers.  Comparable data were not collected in 2005, so it is unknown if there was a change from one year to the next.

The survey was sent last summer to about 17,000 Washington businesses with two or more employees and generated approximately 8,500 responses.  Statewide, there about 104,000 employers with two or more employees. 

Web Links
2006 Employee Benefits Report