Such disclosure is necessary because many employees “are unaware” of the value of coverage, the administration said of the idea that was included in its fiscal 2009 budget proposal released Monday, February 4.

The current lack of transparency may result in “inefficient choices of health coverage, including overconsumption of health coverages by employees,” the administration said.

Under the proposal, costs of health care-related plans in which employees are enrolled, such as medical, dental and vision plans, could be aggregated. Contributions, if any, to health savings accounts would be excluded.

Cost information would be reported based on “similarly situated” employees who receive the same level of coverage, such as individual or family coverage. Costs, however, would not be reported on a specific employee’s use of health care services during a year.

Meanwhile, the Bush administration also recommended several changes to health savings accounts that it first proposed last year, but on which Congress took no action. Under one proposal, for example, HSAs could be set up without being linked to high-deductible insurance plans, as is the case now. Instead, HSAs could be paired with insurance plans that have a 50 percent co-insurance requirement.

Such a design would increase the appeal of HSAs to lower-income employees who now may be hesitant to enroll in HSAs because they are worried that they could face big medical bills before insurance coverage kicks in.

Filed by Jerry Geisel of Business Insurance, a sister publication of Workforce Management. To comment, e-mail editors@workforce.com.