Family Health Premiums Top $28,000 as Employers Shift More of the Bill

The cost of covering a family through an employer health plan has passed $28,000 a year, and a growing slice of that bill is landing on households rather than companies, according to the annual benchmark survey of employer health benefits released Thursday by KFF, the nonpartisan health research group.

Total premiums for family coverage averaged $28,303 in 2026, up 5 percent, or $1,310, from last year. Over the same period wages rose 3.7 percent and general inflation 2.7 percent, KFF said, though prices have climbed faster in recent months.

The sharper increase came in what families pay directly. Covered employees now contribute an average of $7,471 a year toward family premiums, up 9 percent, or $621, from 2025. At small firms with fewer than 200 employees the burden is heavier still: an average of $9,687 a year, about $2,850 more than at large firms.

Most large employers told KFF they had passed rising costs along, chiefly by raising the share of the premium that employees cover, which 44 percent did, or by raising deductibles and other cost-sharing, which 21 percent did. The survey covered more than 1,900 employers with at least 10 employees and describes the plans that cover almost 157 million Americans under 65.

Matthew Rae, an associate director at KFF, told NPR that the total family premium is now roughly the price of a new car every year. He said the 5 percent rise continues a period of fairly modest growth, but warned that if the faster increase in employee contributions marks the start of a broader shift of costs onto families, it would be a significant blow to affordability.

There is a fair case that the picture is less dire than the headline figure suggests. KFF noted that since 2021 family premiums and employee contributions have risen at about the same pace as wages and inflation, 28 percent and 26 percent against 27 percent and 24 percent. Employers still pay roughly three-quarters of the total premium.

But high premiums are only part of the strain. A second report published Thursday, a biennial survey by the Commonwealth Fund, found that about 43 percent of people with employer coverage said they had skipped care because of cost in the past year, and about 31 percent reported medical debt, according to its lead author, Sara Collins. The same survey found the overall uninsured rate had risen over the past two years, which Collins tied to the expiration of extra federal subsidies for Affordable Care Act plans and to people losing Medicaid coverage.

The findings arrive less than two weeks before the midterm elections, with health costs a central issue. KFF’s president, Drew Altman, said the jump in what families pay toward premiums adds to the reasons voters are worried about health care, on top of cuts to the Affordable Care Act and Medicaid. The Commonwealth Fund survey found that nearly three-quarters of respondents, including about 45 percent of Republicans, said the federal government has a responsibility to make sure all Americans have coverage.