Health insurance is getting more expensive by the day. As we continue to hear story after story of health insurance costs eating into family budgets and erasing wages, we want to build a plan to fight together for more affordable health insurance for members like you.
We recently took the first step to gather data from all of you about how your health insurance is working, or not working, for you.
Our pollster, DFM Research, conducted the survey online and 557 members completed the survey which gives us a margin of error of plus or minus four percentage points.
Several trends emerged as we looked at the polling results:
- Across the state, premiums are often fully covered by employers for single plans, but the premiums escalate quickly for single plus spouse/dependent and family plans.
- Almost a quarter of members on family plans are paying more than $1,000 per month for their insurance premium.
- Almost a third of members are enrolled in high-deductible health plans, which shift the financial risk and burden onto employees and often lead to delayed care.
- Affordability of insurance is a concern across the state, but our members in rural communities are feeling the crunch more than ever. Nearly half of members in small towns and rural communities say their health insurance is “unaffordable” or “very unaffordable.”
- 61% of members have had to delay care due to cost concerns.
- 82% of members agree or strongly agree with the following statement: “The raises I have received at work are being limited by the constantly rising costs of health insurance premiums.”
Going forward, we will continue to listen to our members concerns about health insurance and work collectively to build a plan for action for the legislative session of 2027 and contract negotiations for our K-12 teachers in the spring of 2027.
