Revising Employee Benefits for the Sake of Health

Study Summary

This study will explore ways in which employee benefits may be designed to improve people's health, through examining the viewpoints and preferences of low-income people. A person's health is affected not only by being able to receive health care but also by several factors such as income and education. People with lower incomes have been found to be not as healthy as those with higher incomes. While the governments of many countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development are currently working on public policy to address this topic, the likelihood is small that the United States, given its market-based economy, will do the same. However, owing to the heavy reliance in the United States on employer-sponsored health insurance, it would be useful to explore the possibility of insuring some of the measures that people can take to improve their health, and to do that through employee benefit packages. Solutions might include extended unemployment insurance, more education, job training, exercise programs, help for housing, disability insurance, and extra retirement benefits. Adults who have a minimum of a sixth-grade reading level, have low incomes, are English speaking may be eligible for this study. For recruitment, 400 people who live and work in the Washington, D.C, area will be invited to participate, and about12 people will take part in each session. Unless people in the study participate during working hours, they will each be paid $75 at the conclusion of the session. The study consists of one phase, in which participants will engage in a group exercise that lasts for approximately 2-1/2 hours. During that time, participants will have the chance to say what employee benefits they would choose, if the opportunity arose, to improve their health. They will first make those choices by themselves and then make choices along with other people in the group. While group members talk, the discussion will be recorded on a tape recorder. Participants