Employee Benefits Market Check Survey: 2024 Employer Health and Well-Being Strategies

Employers looking ahead to 2024 remain tasked with ensuring their benefit plan is competitive while focusing on their top priority, managing costs to meet budget (see January 2023 Market Check Survey). Thus, many continue to explore additional offerings and expand access to critical resources in supporting their workforce.

We conducted a poll during a webcast on August 25 to see employers’ plans for the following year. We compare these results against responses from the same poll in August 2020, 2021, and 2022. The results are in the charts below.

Employer Medical Strategies

Employer Non-Medical Strategies

*August 2023 results based on 170 employer respondents (allowed to select multiple responses)

Key Findings

While a tight labor market continues, employers are bracing for their most challenging renewal cycle since the beginning of the pandemic. Employers anticipate higher medical premiums for several reasons as the health care trend lags behind general inflation. Companies may be unable to offset increasing costs by shifting more financial burden to employees. Still, the responses above highlight that this year, employers will be less likely to reduce workers’ financial exposure through their medical plan. Further, tightening budgets may restrict employers from offering other services as they have in the past. Conversely, adding additional voluntary products remains a strong approach for plan sponsors since the choice of benefits is at the individual’s discretion. As costs remain a concern, employers will need other strategies to help bend the cost curve.

These strategies are only some of what is available to employers. Should you have any questions regarding any of this information, industry-specific data, or about other avenues to explore, please contact your local Assurex Global adviser.