On the West Coast, the nation's largest municipal-operated health plan is trying to mesh its compensation structure with its nonprofit mission.
L.A. Care Health Plan, an 18-year-old community-based health plan owned by Los Angeles County, has raised its minimum wage to $15 per hour, 66 percent more than California's $9 minimum wage.
This new base pay for the likes of call center, customer support and hour hourly-based workers was based "what is considered an acceptable wage by a diverse group of economists, social scientists and elected officials," L.A. Care Health Plan said.
"As one of the larger employers in downtown Los Angeles, I believe our compensation structure must be aligned with our mission," said L.A. Care CEO John Baackes, a former AmeriHealth Caritas executive who took L.A. Care's helm earlier this spring. "This increase in minimum wage will contribute to our employees' wellbeing and to a more vibrant Los Angeles economy." (Los Angeles city councillors are set to consider voting on a bill to raise the citywide minimum wage to $15 by 2020.)
Baackes said the wage increase would pay off in terms of retention, productivity and recruitment--much the same conclusion Aetna came to when deciding to increase minimum wages to $16 an hour.
L.A. Care is also making health insurance and other benefits available sooner to new hires. Among other benefits, the insurer offers credit union access, tuition reimbursement and an active employee activities association.
With 1.7 million members, L.A. Care is the country's largest local publicly-operated health plan, with public exchange plans, Medicaid plans, dual eligible plans, CHIP and the PASC-SEIU Homecare Workers Health Care Plan.
L.A. Care has around 1,000 employees, up from 700 in 2012, a surge concurrent with "rapid and dramatic" growth "due to the Affordable Care Act," as the health plan's board of governors chair, Thomas Horowitz, MD, said recently. Currently, more than 120 jobs are open at the company, including for a data integration developer, a Medicare operations project manager and a multi-lingual membership liaison.