While the pace of enrollment in health savings accounts (HSAs) has been blistering—a tripling of enrollees to 3 million in the last 10 months—the high-deductible plans still cover only a fraction of the 198 million Americans with health insurance, according to an article in the Los Angeles Times. And although President George Bush is expected to ask Congress to make HSAs more attractive by increasing the amount that can be contributed tax-free, half of those who have already signed up for HSAs have not funded their accounts, reports a New York Times article. When given other employer-sponsored health plan options, few employees—3% of IBM employees, for example—opt for HSAs. Yet the market research firm Forrester Research predicts that in two years, 22 million people—12% of insured Americans—will have HSAs.
