US charities hit by health care costs

Community Action, Oct 25, 2004

BALTIMORE -- Charities and other non-profits are paying a "silent tax" according to a report by Johns Hopkins Center for Civil Society Studies as part of its Nonprofit Listening Post Project. It indicates that U.S. nonprofit organizations are being hit harder than most other enterprises by escalating health benefit costs.

A nationwide sample of over 250 nonprofit agencies that serve children, the elderly, community development, and the arts, the Johns Hopkins survey documents exploding health benefit costs on U.S. charitable organizations.

To deal with these costs non-profits:

* shifted more than 60% of costs onto their employees,

* eliminated pay raises,

* reduced other employee benefits in response to rising health benefits costs.

According the study, health benefit costs are one of the attractions of working in a non-profit, as 93 percent of the organizations surveyed reported providing health insurance coverage for their employees, well above the average for private firms.

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