Do High-Deductible Health Plans Threaten Quality of Care?

It is written that employers struggling with rising health care costs are implementing their strategy for the post–managed-care era — a shift of costs and responsibility to the consumer.

Abstract

Interview with James Robinson and Thomas Lee on health savings accounts and high-deductible plans. (09:47)Download Employers struggling with rising health care costs are implementing their strategy for the post–managed-care era — a shift of costs and responsibility to the consumer. As Robinson describes in this issue of the Journal (pages 1199–1202), this shift is likely to be accelerated by the spread of health savings accounts, which are expected to encourage as many as 25 percent of privately insured Americans to enroll in “high-deductible health plans” by the end of the decade. With these insurance products, patients bear a substantial portion of their health care costs ($1,000 or more per year for individuals). Advocates of these . . .