Health Care Costs

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The Labor Center’s research on health care costs analyzes the affordability of coverage and care for Californians enrolled in job-based coverage or Covered California, underlying health care cost trends, and the impact of potential solutions to control health care costs and improve affordability for California’s working families. This research includes a recent blog series Rising Health Care Costs in California: A Worker Issue.

Research & Publications

April 14, 2022 -

Miranda Dietz, Srikanth Kadiyala, Tynan Challenor, Annie Rak, Laurel Lucia, Dylan H. Robyand Gerald F. Kominski

The Threat to Coverage and Affordability Gains in Covered California if Congress Fails to Renew Subsidy Enhancements

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Congress enacted the American Rescue Plan of 2021 to provide additional temporary financial help for buying health insurance through the ACA Marketplaces. If these enhanced subsidies are not extended for 2023 and beyond, we project 220,000 fewer Californians would have individual market insurance in 2023 than if enhanced subsidies are extended, and premiums would be less affordable for more than two million individual market enrollees.

April 14, 2022 -

RELEASE: Health coverage for nearly 1M Californians will be affected by Medi-Cal expansion and federal subsidies extension

Two reports released today project how the expansion of Medi-Cal eligibility to all low-income adults regardless of immigration status and the discontinuation of enhanced federal subsidies in Covered California would affect health coverage for nearly one million Californians

May 4, 2021 -

Laurel Lucia

Proposed Office of Health Care Affordability: An important step towards addressing the health care cost problem for California workers

This blog post focuses on one policy idea currently being considered by state policymakers to address rising health care costs – creating an Office of Health Care Affordability.

April 13, 2021 -

Miranda Dietz, Laurel Lucia, Srikanth Kadiyala, Tynan Challenor, Annie Rak, Dylan H. Robyand Gerald F. Kominski

Undocumented Californians Projected to Remain the Largest Group of Uninsured in the State in 2022

Even after the American Rescue Plan (ARP) substantially increases premium subsidies for health insurance coverage purchased through Covered California, large inequities remain in who has access to affordable coverage. Nearly 3.2 million Californians will remain uninsured in 2022, or about 9.5% of the population age 0-64, according to our projections. The highest uninsured rates will be among undocumented Californians (65%) and those eligible only for insurance through Covered California (28%).

October 30, 2020 -

Laurel Lucia

VIDEO: California Assembly Committee on Health Care Affordability: How to Control Costs in California

Testimony from Assembly hearing on California’s current health care system.

February 20, 2020 -

Laurel Lucia

High Health Care Prices are the Primary Driver of California Workers’ Health Care Cost Problems

This is the eighth post in the Labor Center’s blog series “Rising Health Care Costs in California: A Worker Issue.”

January 29, 2020 -

Laurel Luciaand Ken Jacobs

Increases in health care costs are coming out of workers’ pockets one way or another: The tradeoff between employer premium contributions and wages

This is the seventh post in the Labor Center’s blog series “Rising Health Care Costs in California: A Worker Issue.”

December 18, 2019 -

Kevin Leeand Laurel Lucia

High out-of-pocket costs contribute to poor access to care and financial hardships for California workers

This is the sixth post in the Labor Center’s blog series “Rising Health Care Costs in California: A Worker Issue.” In our last post, we explored the challenges associated with…

December 12, 2019 -

Alex Matthewsand Laurel Lucia

Low-income workers and families struggle with premium contributions

This is the fifth post in the Labor Center’s blog series “Rising Health Care Costs in California: A Worker Issue.” As described in the last blog post, premiums for job-based…

December 3, 2019 -

Alex Matthews, Laurel Luciaand Dave Graham-Squire

Health care costs under job-based plans have grown rapidly, while wages remained flat

This is the fourth post in the Labor Center’s blog series “Rising Health Care Costs in California: A Worker Issue.” Over the last ten years, the cost of job-based health…

November 22, 2019 -

Kevin Lee, Laurel Lucia, Dave Graham-Squireand Miranda Dietz

Job-based coverage is less common among workers who are Black or Latino, low-wage, immigrants, and young adults

This is the third post in the Labor Center’s blog series “Rising Health Care Costs in California: A Worker Issue.” Job-based coverage remains the most common form of health coverage…

November 19, 2019 -

Laurel Lucia, Xiao Chen, Dave Graham-Squire, Hanqing Yao, Petra W. Rasmussen, Greg Watson, Dylan H. Roby, Ken Jacobs, Srikanth Kadiyala, Gerald F. Kominskiand Miranda Dietz

California’s Steps to Expand Health Coverage and Improve Affordability: Who Gains and Who Will Be Uninsured?

In 2019, state lawmakers took steps to protect California’s coverage gains and increase affordability of coverage by instituting a state individual mandate penalty, providing additional subsidies for Covered California’s individual market enrollees, and expanding Medi-Cal to low-income undocumented young adults. California is the first state to include undocumented adults in full Medicaid benefits and the first to provide subsidies to middle-class consumers not eligible under the ACA.

November 14, 2019 -

Kevin Lee, Laurel Luciaand Dave Graham-Squire

More than half of California adults have job-based coverage

This is the second post in the Labor Center’s blog series “Rising Health Care Costs in California: A Worker Issue.” While our blog series will primarily focus on Californians with…

November 14, 2019 -

Laurel Lucia

New blog post series on the problem of rising health care costs for California families with job-based coverage

This is the first post in the Labor Center’s blog series “Rising Health Care Costs in California: A Worker Issue.” California workers with job-based health coverage are feeling the pain…

July 15, 2019 -

Laurel Lucia

ACA Excise Tax Likely to Further Shift Health Costs to Workers

Instead of cost containment, the most likely outcome of the excise tax is that workers will bear the brunt of this tax through increased copays and deductibles.

April 25, 2019 -

Miranda Dietz, Laurel Lucia, Srikanth Kadiyala, Petra W. Rasmussen, Ken Jacobs, Dylan H. Roby, Dave Graham-Squire, Jason Zhang, Greg Watson, Xiao Chenand Gerald F. Kominski

3.6 Million Californians Would Benefit if California Takes Bold Action to Expand Coverage and Improve Affordability

Many California policymakers have expressed a desire and commitment to resist federal sabotage of the ACA, control health care costs, and achieve universal health care coverage. As the state explores ways to fundamentally redesign our health care delivery system—including by adopting a single payer or other unified public financing approach—state policymakers are also considering near-term policies that do not require federal approval but address the immediate challenges of improving affordability and expanding coverage.

April 25, 2019 -

UC Berkeley Labor Center

RELEASE: 3.6 Million Californians to Benefit if State Takes Bold Action to Expand Coverage and Improve Affordability

California made historic gains in health insurance coverage under the Affordable Care Act (ACA), but several million Californians remain uninsured and many struggle to afford individual market insurance.

November 27, 2018 -

Miranda Dietz, Laurel Lucia, Dylan H. Roby, Ken Jacobs, Petra W. Rasmussen, Xiao Chen, Dave Graham-Squire, Greg Watson, Ian Eve Perryand Gerald F. Kominski

California’s Health Coverage Gains to Erode Without Further State Action

We project that between 150,000 and 450,000 more Californians will be uninsured in 2020, growing to between 490,000 and 790,000 more uninsured in 2023, compared to the projected number if the ACA penalty had been maintained.

March 5, 2018 -

Laurel Luciaand Ken Jacobs

Towards Universal Health Coverage: California Policy Options for Improving Individual Market Affordability and Enrollment

In this report, we focus specifically on the affordability challenges for the 2.3 million Californians who purchase private insurance individually and for many of the 1.2 million Californians who are eligible to purchase insurance through Covered California but remain uninsured.

March 5, 2018 -

UC Berkeley Labor Center

RELEASE: New UC Berkeley Report Identifies Policy Options for Narrowing California’s Coverage Gaps

Affordability is a barrier to enrollment and care for those purchasing insurance individually.