> Employer-provided health insurance has its origin in a tax policy passed in 1943, which made insurance provided by employers tax free. At the time the United States was engaged in World War II and had enacted wage and price controls, preventing employers from competing for scarce labor using the normal mechanism of offering a higher salary. Instead, businesses used the availability of newly tax-subsidized healthcare as a means of differentiating themselves.
> The tax advantages were made even more attractive and fully codified in the 1954 Internal Revenue Code. Over the next few decades, the government's subsidization of employer-provided health insurance lead to the dominance of that model of healthcare delivery...[1]
So steps that got us here:
1. Enter into WWII
2. Enact price & wage controls
3. Create tax loophole for employer-provided plans
4. Enshrine loophole into the tax code
These are not market phenomena, since government intervention got us here.
[1] https://mises.org/library/whats-really-wrong-healthcare-indu...
What if the government was able to pass legislation banning employer healthcare? I imagine the issue of healthcare coverage would resolve very shortly thereafter.
What's special about 401k matching that requires the employer to choose plans? My employer doesn't force me to have a checking account with a particular bank they chose if I want to receive my salary. They should be able to match contributions to any account anywhere.
A lot of times the employers are capped on their own plans at a percentage rate that matches their employee’s participating. So matching is often in their best interest, esp at smaller companies.
But, easier version is this is a perk, not your base salary. They are paying you with legal tender and there are freedoms associated to that. There is no such thing for perks.
You aren’t entitled to make the administration choices for something they are gifting you.
I actually do not understand this. Could you please explain more? What does an employer being "capped on their own plans" mean?
> But, easier version is this is a perk, not your base salary
When I make a decision on a job offer, the 401k match, health insurance premium, free lunch and snacks etc. all factor in and they're all worth a certain amount of money. Money is money and how it's labeled, "perk" or "base", is irrelevant. If my employer ends 401k matching, I'll treat it as a pay cut mentally.
My ultimate "fantasy" is to eliminate 401k altogether and instead let everyone contribute whatever the 401k annual limit is to an IRA. The employer can simply add matching funds to your IRA and you're free to have your retirement accounts anywhere you please.
The employer-provided system--which arose out of WWII-era wage controls, for those who don't know--has not only created the "have/have not" dichotomy in U.S. healthcare, it has also warped expectations about what "insurance" is supposed to cover--and broken normal pricing mechanisms.
I think we are running along some tracks that were laid long ago, and rather than all jumping off, some people in comfy Pullman cars are content with letting the train run off a cliff.