Job-Based Health Benefits Continue to Rise While Uninsured Rate Declines

This paper examines recent trends in health insurance coverage. We found that nearly 66 percent of Americans under age 65--or 158.4 million Americans--were covered by an employment-based health plan during 1999. This is up significantly from 1998, when 64.9 percent of the nonelderly population was covered by an employment-based health plan, and continues a longer-term trend that started between 1993 and 1994. Furthermore, for the first time since 1993, the expansion in employment-based health insurance coverage has been coupled with a decline in the percentage and number of Americans without health insurance coverage. Between 1998 and 1999, the number of uninsured nonelderly Americans declined from 43.9 million to 42.1 million, while the percentage declined from 18.4 percent to 17.5 percent