Abortion Coverage Is Limited or Unavailable at a Quarter of Large Workplaces

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2 years ago

October 19, 2023

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About a quarter of large U.S. employers heavily restrict coverage of legal abortions or dont cover them at all under health plans for their workers, according to the latest employer health benefits survey by KFF. Use Our Content

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The findings demonstrate another realm, beyond state laws, in which access to abortion care varies widely across America since the Supreme Court overturned the constitutional right to abortion last year in Dobbs v. Jackson Womens Health Organization.

More than ever, where someone works and the constraints of their health insurance can determine whether an abortion is possible. Workers without coverage are left to pay out-of-pocket for abortion care and related costs.

In 2021, the median costs for people paying out-of-pocket in the first trimester were $568 for a medication abortion and $625 for an abortion procedure, according to a report from Advancing New Standards in Reproductive Health at the University of California-San Francisco. By the second trimester, the cost increased to $775 for abortion procedures.

KFFs 2023 annual survey found that 10% of large employers defined as those with at least 200 workers dont cover legal abortion care under their largest job-based health plan. An additional 18% said legal abortions are covered only in limited circumstances, such as when a pregnancy is the result of rape or incest, or endangers a persons life or health.

The share of employers that said they dont cover abortion under any circumstances is bigger than I would have expected, said Matthew Rae, an associate director at KFF who helped conduct the survey.

So far, 14 states, mostly in the South and Midwest, have enacted near-total abortion bans, and an additional seven states have instituted gestational limits between six and 18 weeks. Abortion is legal in 24 states and the District of Columbia. Email Sign-Up

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Sharply divergent state abortion laws solidified in the aftermath of the Dobbs decision compound the complexity for employers with workers across multiple states, Rae said. Many large companies employ people in places with vastly different abortion policies, and their health benefits are more likely to cover dependents who may live elsewhere.

Those dependents can be college kids and college kids can be anywhere or any other type of dependent who could just spread out over an area much larger than where you just have actual physical establishments, Rae said.

The KFF survey found that about a third of large companies said they cover legal abortions in most or all circumstances; the largest companies, with at least 5,000 employees, were more likely to offer the benefit compared with smaller firms. An additional 40% said they were unsure of their coverage perhaps because employer policies are in flux, Rae said.

Employer health plans treatment of abortion has changed little since the Dobbs decision, the survey found. Among companies that said they did not cover legally provided abortion services or covered them in limited circumstances, 3% reduced or eliminated abortion coverage. By contrast, of the large companies that generally covered abortion, 12% added or significantly expanded coverage.

Thats in sharp contrast to the rapidly changing laws governing abortion access in the states. Its unclear whether workers at companies that dont cover abortion or heavily restrict coverage are located primarily in states that have outlawed the procedure.

The KFF survey includes information from more than 2,100 large and small companies on their health benefits and the related costs for workers. Annual premiums for family coverage rose 7% on average this year, to $23,968, with employees on average contributing $6,575 toward that cost. The jump in premiums represents a notable increase compared with that of the previous year, when there was virtually no growth in those costs. Average yearly deductibles for workers were $1,735 for single coverage, a cost that was relatively unchanged.

One tactic employers use is to provide separate benefits for abortion-related expenses. In response to increasingly restrictive state abortion laws and the Supreme Courts decision, large companies such as Amazon, Starbucks, Disney, Meta, and JPMorgan Chase, among others announced they would pay for employees abortion-related travel expenses.

However, the KFF survey found that a small share of large employers said they provide or plan to provide workers with financial help to cover abortion-related travel expenses. Companies with at least 5,000 workers are the most likely to provide that assistance. Overall, 7% of large employers said they provide or plan to provide financial assistance to employees who must travel out of state for abortion care.

According to the Brigid Alliance, a New York-based nonprofit that helps people with logistics and defrays abortion-related costs, average travel costs now exceed $2,300. As restrictive laws proliferate, distances traveled have also increased since the Dobbs ruling, with each person on average traveling roughly 1,300 miles round trip in the first half of 2023.

Recent research published by job-search firm Indeed, the Institute of Labor Economics, and academics from the University of Southern California and the University of Maryland found that employers that announced abortion-related travel benefits saw an 8% increase in clicks on their job postings compared with similar jobs at comparable employers that did not announce such a policy.

However, job satisfaction among existing employees also dropped at those companies, with ratings of senior management dropping 8%, driven by workers in typically male-dominated jobs, they wrote, illustrating both the potential perks and pitfalls for companies that choose to wade into contentious political waters.

Rachana Pradhan: rpradhan@kff.org, @rachanadpradhan Related Topics Insurance States Abortion KFF Polls Women's Health Contact Us Submit a Story Tip

US

Donald Trump sending ‘top of the line’ weapons to support NATO in Ukraine war

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2 hours ago

July 15, 2025

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Donald Trump sending 'top of the line' weapons to support NATO in Ukraine war

Donald Trump has agreed to send “top of the line weapons” to NATO to support Ukraine – and threatened Russia with “severe” tariffs if it doesn’t agree to end the war.

Speaking with NATO secretary-general Mark Rutte during a meeting at the White House, the US president said: “We’ve made a deal today where we are going to be sending them weapons, and they’re going to be paying for them.

“This is billions of dollars worth of military equipment which is going to be purchased from the United States, going to NATO, and that’s going to be quickly distributed to the battlefield.”

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Weapons being sent include surface-to-air Patriot missile systems and batteries, which Ukraine has asked for to defend itself from Russian air strikes.

Mr Trump also said he was “very unhappy” with Russia, and threatened “severe tariffs” of “about 100%” if there isn’t a deal to end the war in Ukraine within 50 days.

The White House added that the US would put “secondary sanctions” on countries that buy oil from Russia if an agreement was not reached.

Later on Monday, Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy thanked Mr Trump and said he was “grateful” for the US president’s “readiness to help protect our people’s lives”.

After criticising Vladimir Putin’s “desire to drag it out”, he said he appreciated “preparing a new decision on Patriots for Ukraine” – and added Kyiv is “working on major defence agreements with America”.

It comes after weeks of frustration from Mr Trump over Mr Putin’s refusal to agree to an end to the conflict, with the Russian leader telling the US president he would “not back down” from Moscow’s goals in Ukraine at the start of the month.

During the briefing on Monday, Mr Trump said he had held calls with Mr Putin where he would think “that was a nice phone call”, but then “missiles are launched into Kyiv or some other city, and that happens three or four times”.

“I don’t want to say he’s an assassin, but he’s a tough guy,” he added.

Earlier this year, Mr Trump told Mr Zelenskyy “you’re gambling with World War Three” in a fiery White House meeting, and suggested Ukraine started the war against Russia as he sought to negotiate an end to the conflict.

After Mr Trump’s briefing, Russian senator Konstantin Kosachev said on Telegram: “If this is all that Trump had in mind to say about Ukraine today, then all the steam has gone out.”

Meanwhile, Mr Zelenskyy met with US special envoy Keith Kellogg in Kyiv, where they “discussed the path to peace” by “strengthening Ukraine’s air defence, joint production, and procurement of defence weapons in collaboration with Europe”.

He thanked both the envoy for the visit and Mr Trump “for the important signals of support and the positive decisions for both our countries”.

US

Trump is clearly fed up with Putin – but will his shift in tone force Russia to the negotiating table?

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2 hours ago

July 15, 2025

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Trump is clearly fed up with Putin - but will his shift in tone force Russia to the negotiating table?

As ever, there is confusion and key questions are left unanswered, but Donald Trump’s announcement on Ukraine and Russia today remains hugely significant.

His shift in tone and policy on Ukraine is stark. And his shift in tone (and perhaps policy) on Russia is huge.

Ever since Mr Trump returned to the White House he has flatly refused to side with Ukraine over the Russian invasion.

He has variously blamed Ukraine for the invasion and blamed Joe Biden for the invasion, but has never been willing to accept that Russia is the aggressor and that Ukraine has a legitimate right to defend itself.

Today, all that changed. In a clear signal that he is fed up with Vladimir Putin and now fully recognises the need to help Ukraine defend itself, he announced the US will dramatically increase weapons supplies to Kyiv.

But, in keeping with his transactional nature and in a reflection of the need to keep his isolationist “America-First” base on side, he has framed this policy shift as a multi-billion dollar “deal” in which America gains financially.

American weapons are to be “sold” to NATO partners in Europe who will then either transfer them to Ukraine or use them to bolster their own stockpiles as they transfer their own existing stocks to Kyiv.

“We’ve made a deal today,” the president said in the Oval Office. “We are going to be sending them weapons, and they are paying for them. We are manufacturing, they are going to be paying for it. Our meeting last month was very successful… these are wealthy nations.”

This appears to be a clever framing of the “deal”. Firstly, America has always benefited financially by supplying weapons to Ukraine because much of the investment has been in American factories, American jobs and American supply chains.

While the details are not entirely clear, the difference now appears to be that the weapons would be bought by the Europeans or by NATO as an alliance.

The Americans are the biggest contributor to NATO, and so if the alliance is buying the weapons, America too will be paying, in part, for the weapons it is selling.

However, if the weapons are being bought by individual NATO members to replenish their own stocks, then it may be the case that the US is not paying.

NATO officials referred all questions on this issue to the White House, which has not yet provided clarity to Sky News.

It is also not yet clear what type of weapons will be made available and whether it will include offensive, as well defensive, munitions.

A key element of the package will likely be Patriot missile batteries, 10 to 15 of which are believed to be currently in Europe.

Under this deal, it is understood that some of them will be added to the six or so batteries believed to be presently in Ukraine. New ones would then be purchased from US manufacturers to backfill European stocks. A similar arrangement may be used for other weapons.

The president also issued the Russian leader with an ultimatum, saying that Putin had 50 days to make a peace deal or else face 100% “secondary tariffs”. It’s thought this refers to a plan to tariff, or sanction, third countries that supply Russia with weapons and buy Russian oil.

This, the Americans hope, will force those countries to apply pressure on Russia.

But the 50-day kicking of the can down the road also gives Russia space to prevaricate. So, a few words of caution: first, the Russians are masters of prevarication. Second, Trump tends to let deadlines slip. And third, we all know Trump can flip-flop on his position repeatedly.

Maybe the most revealing aspect of all this came when a reporter asked Mr Trump: “How far are you willing to go if Putin sends more bombs in the coming days?”

“Don’t ask me questions like that…”

Mr Trump doesn’t really know what to do if Mr Putin continues to take him for a ride.

Mr Biden, before him, supplied Ukraine with the weapons to continue fighting.

If Mr Trump wants to end this, he may need to provide Ukraine with enough weapons to win.

But that would prolong, or even escalate, a war he wants to end now.

There’s the predicament.

Technology

Nvidia says U.S. government will allow it to resume H20 AI chip sales to China

Published

3 hours ago

July 15, 2025

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Nvidia says U.S. government will allow it to resume H20 AI chip sales to China

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang attends a roundtable discussion at the Viva Technology conference dedicated to innovation and startups at Porte de Versailles exhibition center in Paris on June 11, 2025.

Sarah Meyssonnier | Reuters

Nvidia announced Tuesday that it hopes to resume sales of its H20 general processing units to clients in China, saying that the U.S. government had assured the company would be granted licenses.

Nvidia’s sales of the H20 chips, which had been designed specifically to keep them out of export controls on China, were halted in April.

“The U.S. government has assured NVIDIA that licenses will be granted, and NVIDIA hopes to start deliveries soon,” the company said in a statement.

This comes against the backdrop of a preliminary trade deal between Washington and Beijing last month that sought China to resume rare earth exports and the U.S. to relax tech export controls.

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang in recent months has ramped up his lobbying against export controls, arguing that they inhibited American tech leadership. In May, Huang said chip restrictions had already cut Nvidia’s China market share nearly in half.

Huang also announced a new “fully compliant” GPU, NVIDIA RTX PRO, saying it was ideal for smart factories and logistics.

The potential change in U.S. stance follows a meeting between Huang and U.S. President Donald Trump last week.

In his meeting with Trump and U.S. policymakers, Huang had reaffirmed Nvidia’s support for the administration’s job creation and onshoring efforts, as well as the aim for America to lead in global AI, the company said.

Meanwhile, in Beijing, it was confirmed that Huang has met with government and industry officials to discuss the benefits of AI and ways for researchers to advance safe and secure AI for the benefit of all.