
Ask HN: Why is health insurance bound to employers in the US? - hguhghuff
It appears that health insurance in the US is tightly bound to the employer in some way.<p>Why is this? Doesn&#x27;t seem to make sense at any level.
======
sarcasmic
See the history of the Stabilization Act of 1942 [1] and Executive Order 9250.
Wages were frozen by law, but not benefits, so companies began offering
benefits, including health insurance [2] The next year the IRS decided these
were nontaxable, until it changed its mind in 1953, only to be overruled by
Congress in 1954 [3].

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stabilization_Act_of_1942](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stabilization_Act_of_1942)
[2] [https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/05/upshot/the-real-reason-
th...](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/05/upshot/the-real-reason-the-us-has-
employer-sponsored-health-insurance.html) [3]
[https://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/07/30/the-
question-o...](https://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/07/30/the-question-of-
taxing-employer-provided-health-insurance/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_r=0)

------
howard941
The conventional explanation blames WW2 wage controls for creating the benefit
as a differentiator.

The more cynical among us suffer it as cost of satisfying capital by way of
employee job lock, particularly when coupled with the soon-to-return
preexisting condition exclusions, and even though the locks disincentivize
entrepreneurship and other sorts of beneficial risk tasking.

~~~
hguhghuff
So actually it doesn't make sense but some company benefits so it's locked in
forever that way?

