cute. Of course, you could have simply said “end of message” (or were you going for “employee of the month”?)
Also; re-your story about your daughter etc. No applicable.
Referring back to the OP:
The rider involved is only for b/c prescriptions and costs a very small amount (compared to the cost of the health insurance in the first place), and is certainly less expensive than other riders. So, what is the impulse for setting this one aside. mr. decembers list certainly doesn’t answer it. When an employer is determining the level of benefits those factors wouldn’t come into play (they’re perhaps the cost controls for the insurance co).
Certainly, from a productivity standpoint, it would make sense to enable one’s employees to easily avoid a pregnancy should they desire to do so. So, what is the rationale for not providing it? (in my employer’s case, the director at the time was a Catholic Priest, over the age of 50 - his ‘picks’ for riders on the health coverage matched his own needs. And there weren’t many female employees of child bearing years at the time, either).
december: *Wring – the point of my story was that employees already can easily avoid a pregnancy, even in the absense of employer-supplied birth control. *
Uh-huh. And many people who suffer from allergies, fungal infections, vision defects, and many other unwanted but far-from-catastrophic afflictions that are routinely covered by health insurance, could “easily avoid” them by paying for treatment themselves. Why should birth control in particular be treated differently? Why do you consider that “self-reliance” requires paying for one’s own contraception, but not one’s other prescriptions, out-of-pocket?
(And I must say, your implication that making condoms available in college dorms somehow sends the message that students needn’t take responsibility “for their own protection” is about the silliest thing I’ve ever heard. By that token, you could say that providing snack vending machines in dorms sends the message that students aren’t expected to take responsibility for providing their own sustenance. Ridiculous. It makes perfect sense that a college residence hall should make available some consumer items that students will often want at a time when it’s inconvenient or impossible to procure them from the usual commercial sources, whether those items be snacks, sodas, or condoms, and it has nothing to do with “self-reliance”. Or do you also complain about your employer providing a coffee machine on the grounds that they ought to trust you with the responsibility for obtaining your own caffeine fix?)
Of course. And, the NAACP doesn’t offer their employees a convenient salary deduction plan for Ku Klux Klan dues.
:rolleyes: Employers don’t generally offer salary deduction plans to employees for memberships in any non-professional organization, you know; if they did, they would indeed damn well have to refrain from discriminating among such organizations on political grounds, or the ACLU would be all over their case. Employers do generally offer health insurance benefits to employees, and wring is quite right that it’s not fair to employees to limit the available benefits based simply on the personal moral preferences of the employer.
I used to work for an HMO and b/c coverage was on the rise - significantly (I left the HMO at the end of 1999). As were, by the way, riders to cover other things that aren’t always covered - infertility for instance.
Employers want to keep health care coverage down, but, as the OP pointed out, they also want to retain and recruit the best employees. In a tight labor market, the $2 a month (far less for a big organization) to cover b/c is a small price. People do review their benefits package when considering an offer, and b/c coverage is a factor.
Yeah, you might be able to afford $30 a month - but wouldn’t you rather go to dinner on it (or put it towards your kids college, or your retirement)? And remember, these are government employees (I’ve worked there, too)…not known for market wages.
B/C is prescribed (as has been pointed out) for other illnesses - endometrosis for example. Keeps PMS in check. Some women have periods so bad they take a day off every month. Seems like that $2 a month is a good investment to me - even if only one in ten women need to take that first day off. These are illnesses - valid reasons to prescribe.
However, the question isn’t how/why the health insurer would treat it differently, the question is why would the employer select this option out? Health insurers cover all ages. The employer is really only interested in aspects connected to the employee. How will this benefit effect my employees? Is this an attractive benefit to offer potential employees? Is this a standard offered in other like industries? etc.
Naturally. However, the same is true for absolutely every other prescription. So, how is b/c different? Yes, it will primarily effect certain ages more than others, but frankly, those are the ages of the employees in question.
even sillier perhaps is that I never said that.
Interesting that you should mention this, since the OP is questioning the position of the federal government as an employer (which essentially means all of us citizens). So, if, in this case it seems that you agree that **most ** of the citizens agree that b/c is a personal issue, the cost seems to be quite small, the possability of loosing qualified employees/applicants due to the lack of coverage for this benefit seems to exist, then (ahem) why do it?
even sillier perhaps is that I never said that.**
[/QUOTE]
On 4/13 wring wrote, “Although in terms of the employer, it makes even less sense, since pregnancy will mean a certain number of lost hours, plus the addition of a dependant on the insurance contract.”
IMHO this quote assumes that in the absense of employer-provided birth control, employees (or, at least, some employees) would fail to make use of it, resulting in pregnancies and additional dependants. However, I concede that this is somewhat weaker than the statement I attrributed to wring.
Personally I prefer to see BC covered. However, wring’s argument of "why stop here isn’t as strong as it appears. Coverage has to stop somewhere. It’s like inviting people to a party. One can usually make an argument that some univited person had as great or a greater right to be invited than some invited guest.
Dangerosa’s argument assumes that the BC can be offered free. However, in the real world the employer has a finite amount of money available. Suppose that in order to offer BC coverage, the employer would have to reduce (or not increase) wages (or some other fringe benefit) by the cost of the BC. Then it’s far from clear which option would be best for recruiting and retaining employees.
Re Viagra. Look at criterion #2. BC is for people who have a medical NEED, but not a medical PROBLEM. Viagra is for people who do have a medical problem. AGain, that doesn’t mean that BC shouldn’t be covered, but only that there is a rational basis
december. Of course somewhere the line is drawn. This just seems to be a peculiar place to draw it. The cost for the coverage is minimal, the benefit to the employee is great (for $24 per year, the employee will save $360 for the drugs plus the cost of the exam - when the prescription isn’t covered, neither is the exam).
You keep on focusing on your list. To what purpose? Do you have some evidence to suggest that the employer in this case is assessing the costs in this manner? As an employer, that’s not how I would do it. When I’ve evaluated health plans for my co, I look to cost, yes, but also to standards across the industry for what things are covered.
(my quote re: cost to the employer was not intending to imply that folks wouldn’t pay for their own b/c, just, as a cost adjustment factor for the employer - $24 per year vs. the possability that a single pregnancy would occur over the course of several years - seems to be a cost effective trade off).
Or you could increase the “shared” cost of medical insurance by $2 a month. The government is certainly large enough to have multiple medical plans - some that would be covered completely (traditional 80-20 plans) and some (HMOs) which would require a shared costs. Then you can have levels of service for shared costs - one which would include Birth Control. Government agencies would be required to provide an option that includes birth control, but would be permitted to pass the costs on to the employee. (They do this now).
And, December, we have made the point several times that B/C pills are often prescribed to control illness (i.e. endometriosis), not just birth. When you allow the same prescription to be covered under one circumstance but not the other, you only encourage doctors to provide false diagnosis to the insurance companies.
december I thought that was where you were coming from. You see, the OP in this case, isn’t ‘why would a health insurance carrier put birth control into a different category of risk/assesments etc.’ but why would an employer select that particular one out for non coverage- especially when as Dangerosa has pointed out, things such as infertility (a very expensive item) are increasingly covered.
Well, for the second time recently, a court decision has been made regarding an old thread. Wonder if some one has told Mr. Bush yet? though no doubt this will be appealed.
Ahh, you’re assuming a one to one relationship and you’re leaving out the tax issue. Here are the options:
I will pay you an additional $24 per year (taxed at some rate higher than 15%) and you can buy your own birth control ($440/year)
OR
I can pay you $24 per year less, but your birth control is covered.
Which one would you pick? Considering that I (the employer) ALSO have to pay taxes on the $24, my actual cost is lower if I pay it directly to the HMO! My perceived benefit is higher as I can pitch it to the employee as a $440 benefit while paying a mere $24.
First: Coverage for prescription b/c has been available as a federal employee benefit since… (drum roll please) 1999 for the 9 million federal employees. (suspect that the viagra thing so to speak is why it suddenly became covered). this surprised me.
Second: The amount of extra money that the federal government had to pay for this coverage: (drum roll please) “no cost impact” as a result.
Third: Why is it proposed to be eliminated? drum roll please… we don’t know. the budget proposal presented eliminated that line item, there was no reason given.
So. Any ideas? why in the world would any employer specifically track this item down to eliminate it, given that the cost is ‘no impact’, and the benefit to employees is substantial?