According to Mercer, the average deductible for popular PPO plans now stands at $1,200 annually for employers with 10 or more employees.
The Mercer survey also found that health benefit costs rose 6.9% this year – up from 5.5% in 2009.
Another trend noted in the study is that large employers were adopting high-deductible plans, linked to health savings accounts, more quickly than small employers. The reason? Lower costs – high deductible HSA plans are more than $2,000 a year less expensive per employee, including employer contributions to the savings account.