The University’s Negotiations Team’s Deceptive Health Insurance Offer
The university’s offer on health insurance is deceptive. It allows the university to claim that is expanding access while at the same time pricing faculty out of insurance coverage and forcing faculty and their families onto an costly and risky High-Deductible Health Plan. This sort of plan is designed to protect young, healthy people against catastrophic healthcare costs. Generally speaking, it is not suitable for middle-aged or older faculty, families, or anyone with a chronic health condition.
The university is proposing giving itself unlimited authority to hike out-of-pocket costs. Under our current contract, the university must ensure that copays, deductibles, and out-of-pocket maxes are comparable to the 2020 plan. Under the university’s new offer, any raises to our pay could be wiped out by cost hikes the university makes to copays/coinsurance, deductibles, and out-of-pocket maxes.
The university proposes increasing our premiums by up to 10% each year. When taking into account the fact that these increases compound from year to year, this could result in premiums increasing by up to 61% over the next five years.
Finally, the university’s proposal would force some faculty and their families onto a High-Deductible Health Plan. This is a plan under which the insurance for most kinds of medical care doesn’t kick in until you pay $1,500 to $3,000 out-of-pocket. This is not a plan suitable for families or anyone with a health condition.
Here’s how the university’s proposal would force some faculty member’s family’s onto this risky and costly plan:
Faculty currently have access to a quality EPO plan, a type of health insurance plan with a low deductible and modest copays.
Under our former contract, if faculty earn enough to qualify for health insurance but not enough to cover the premium for the EPO, they can self-pay the difference.
In contrast, under the university’s new offer, faculty who qualify but do not earn enough to cover the premiums for the EPO plan would be forced onto the university’s new High Deductible Health Plan (see the leftmost column for plan details).
Under the university’s proposal, faculty would need to earn $7,128 post-tax to qualify for health insurance coverage. But the total premium for families on the EPO plan under the university’s offer could be as follows next year:
Teaching one course: $17,937 (for the entire year)
Teaching two courses: $11,862 (for the entire year)
Teaching three courses: $10,065 (for the entire year)
Because the university is proposing giving itself the right to hike premiums by 10% each year, or 61% over the lifetime of its offer, these figures could rise to the following by 2027:
Teaching one course: $26,314 per year (for the entire year)
Teaching two courses: $17,367 per year (for the entire year)
Teaching three courses: $14,736 per year (for the entire year)
This means that the families of many faculty who teach two courses will be forced onto the High-Deductible plan because the faculty member qualifies for coverage but can no longer self-pay the difference between the amount that they earn and the premium.
The three points outlined above are the sleight of hand in the university’s healthcare offer.
Though the university is expanding coverage to faculty teaching one-course, the university is simultaneously seeking to push faculty onto an inferior plan and provide itself with the right to make the EPO plan (to which we currently have access) unaffordable and costly.
The bargaining committee is proposing the following on healthcare:
Keep costs manageable:
Keep out-of-pocket costs comparable to the 2020 plan.
Keep faculty premium shares the same as they currently are.
Cap the amount the university can raise premiums by no more than 7.5% each year.
Keep our families covered: Continue to allow faculty to self-pay the difference between their salary and the EPO premiums.
Expand access to faculty teaching one course: Ensure that these faculty can also access the EPO plan, not just the High Deductible Health Plan.