Description:
It is unknown how labor market concentration impacts employee health benefits. We combine data from the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey - Insurance/Employer Component with the Longitudinal Business Database for 2002-2019 to examine how labor market concentration affects contributions to plan premiums and the characteristics of plans offered to employees. We find that a 10% increase labor market concentration is associated with 1.3% higher employee premium contributions, resulting in a 0.5% increase in the employee share of premiums. Additionally, we find a substantial increase in the prevalence of narrower network plans, concentrated primarily within the health care sector