Worksite Wellness: Why Employers Should Care About Employee Health and Wellness

Healthcare costs pose a serious threat to the competitiveness and long-term viability of U.S. businesses which, in turn, affects us all. Consider the following: • Private business expense for healthcare consumes 40% of before tax profit and 58% of after tax profit. • The cost of U.S. Healthcare doubled from 1990 to 2001 and is projected to double again by 2012.
Traditional methods used by businesses to control healthcare costs such as; reducing benefits, increasing employee contributions and the more recent shift to consumer driven health plans are all short-term fixes that fail to address the primary driver of the soaring cost of healthcare – namely inadequate investment in health through primary prevention, health risk management and disease managem View the rest of this article