Employees prefer low-cost plans to traditional employer-based plans

When employees have the option of a traditional employer-sponsored health plan and a cheaper, high-deductible or limited network plan, 60 percent will choose the plan with the lower costs, says a new survey report from Liazon, a provider of private health exchanges. The report also shows that 80 percent of the 2,503 employees surveyed will opt for a plan other than their employer's traditional offering, regardless of whether those prices are the same to the employee. "Most companies were offering high-cost plans and were paying for those plans assuming that's what employees wanted," Alan Cohen, chief strategy officer of Liazon, told USA Today. "But when people see the real costs of these plans, they try to save money." He added that these results have been consistent over the last five years. Article