| News from Washington |
| Government Shutdown Averted as Biden Signs Funding Bill The House of Representatives voted on Friday to approve a stopgap bill to fund the government through December 16, averting a shutdown just hours ahead of a midnight deadline when funding was set to expire. President Joe Biden signed the bill Friday afternoon. The Senate passed the measure on a bipartisan basis on Thursday. Read More |
| Lawmakers Eye Lame Duck for Unfinished Business on Insulin Sens. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) and Susan Collins (R-ME) are still working to pass a bill to overhaul insulin prices, but the outlook is complicated by the messy drug pricing system, politics and a busy congressional calendar. The hurdles that previously stalled the bill remain the same. The policy is complicated. The official cost is expensive. And Republican support is thin. Read More |
| Republicans Abandon Obamacare Repeal With slightly more than a month before the next election, Republicans in Congress and on the campaign trail aren’t making an issue of Obamacare. None of the Republican Senate nominees running in eight key battleground states have called for unwinding the ACA on their campaign websites, according to an NBC News review. The candidates scarcely mention the 2010 law or health insurance policy in general. Read More |
| HSA Compliance Corner |
| Can the Federal Government Really Disqualify You from Funding an HSA? You wouldn’t think the federal government would disqualify its own program. But it could. How can the federal government disqualify someone from opening and funding a Health Savings Account that’s part of the federal tax code? Let’s take a look. Read More |
| HSA Studies & Analysis |
| HSA Growth Rate High, but Investment Assets Lag Behind – Morningstar While Health Savings Account assets have grown at a more than 30% annualized rate over the past 15 years, only 9% of accounts have investment assets, according to Morningstar. The growth is a positive, and many of the 10 most prominent HSA providers have improved their offerings over that time span, but there is room for improvement, according to Morningstar’s latest report. The four largest HSA providers account for 64% of the overall HSA market, and Morningstar rates Fidelity as the most attractive provider. Read More |
| Devenir: Top 20 HSA Market Concentration – 2022 Midyear Update The HSA market is slowly becoming more concentrated over time as some of the top providers continue to gain market share. In fact, the share of the top 5 providers has grown from 60% to 69% of total HSA assets from June 2020 to June 2022, respectively. Read More |
| HSA Industry News |
| Health Benefit Startup Partners with Brokers to Expand Offering Health benefit startup HSARx has announced that it has partnered with two general agencies in Arizona to expand the reach of its offerings. Launched in 2022, HSARx offers traditional pharmacy benefit management savings directly to HSA subscribers. The company enables customers to pay for and obtain discounts on prescription medication while automatically billing their HSA. Read More |
| The HSA Market |
| 4 Economic Benefits of a Health Savings Account for Business Owners As a business owner, offering an HSA is a great way to show employees how much you care about their health and well-being. HSAs help employees keep medical expenses at a minimum and allow them to set aside pre-tax dollars into a tax-advantaged savings account for future medical expenses. While it may seem HSAs only benefit employees, business owners may also see several advantages from offering HSAs Read More |
| Inflation Is Driving Workers to Review Benefit Choices According to new research, 70% of American employees surveyed expect to spend additional time reviewing their benefit selections because of inflation this open-enrollment season. 70% of employees want support from their employer to make the optimal benefits selections across retirement savings, health care, Health Savings Accounts, and voluntary benefits like critical illness or accident insurance. Read More |
| HSAs & Retirement |
| How Does an HSA Fit Into Your Retirement Plan? There’s a common misconception that you don’t have to worry about healthcare costs when you retire because Medicare has you covered. Medicare certainly helps, but if you’re not budgeting for medical bills in retirement, you’re not budgeting enough. Half of the people who participated in a new survey cited a major unexpected healthcare expense as their No. 2 concern for retirement planning. Read More |
| Health in Retirement: 3 Ways To Prepare for a Major Expense HSAs are investment vehicles that offer a unique triple tax advantage. When invested for growth over decades, HSAs can be a very powerful tool for funding healthcare costs in retirement. Unfortunately, most Americans aren’t taking advantage of HSAs’ full potential. Here are the tax advantages of incorporating an HSA into your retirement savings strategy. Read More |
| Medical Costs Can Eat Up a Sizeable Portion of Your Retirement Savings — Here’s How Much You Should Expect to Spend A recent report found that a significant portion of retirees’ savings and Social Security benefits went towards covering their medical expenses. Take a closer look at what percentage of retirees’ income is spent on medical expenses and how you can better prepare to handle these costs in retirement. Read More |
| Maximizing Your HSA |
| Can You Save Too Much in a Health Savings Account? Can you overdo your HSA contributions and put more in the account than you’re likely to spend on healthcare costs? The short answer is that it’s unlikely, largely because HSAs have generous features around withdrawals. In a worst-case scenario where your HSA account balance exceeds your expected healthcare costs, you have two key ways to get your money out sooner without negating the tax benefits of the HSA. Read More |
| How Are You Performing Relative to Other HSA Owners? Does It Matter? Where do you stand among Health Savings Account owners? Many account owners aren’t keeping score. Instead, they’re plugging away, making regular contributions and building a balance to meet an unexpected expense tomorrow or many tomorrows from then. That’s the right approach. But if you’re curious about your performance versus other owners, here are some figures to ponder. Read More |
| Tax Secrets of Health Savings Accounts Millions of Americans will soon face the daunting task of choosing health insurance for 2023. If you’re one of them, it pays to be aware of little-known benefits—and some pitfalls—of Health Savings Accounts. : HSA owners who don’t withdraw from their accounts get tax breaks even better than the ones for IRAs and 401(k)s. Read More |
| Consumer-Driven Health Care |
| 3 Little-Known Perks of a High Health Insurance Deductible If you work for a company that offers a subsidized health plan (which many do), you may be offered the option to select a high-deductible insurance plan. Some health plans have a higher deductible than others, and at first, those might seem like a poor choice. But while high-deductible health insurance plans aren’t perfect, they actually do have their benefits. Here are a few you might appreciate. Read More |
| Use Your Flexible Spending Account Funds by End of the Year Do you have a flexible spending account for your health care needs? If you do, here’s a friendly heads-up: You’d better check and see how much money is left in it. You’re starting to run out of time to spend it. FSAs are “use it or lose it” accounts, so you lose any money you haven’t used by the end of the year. Read More |