Mercer projects the 2024 inflation-adjusted amounts for health savings accounts (HSAs), high-deductible health plans (HDHPs) and excepted-benefit health reimbursement arrangements (HRAs) will rise significantly from 2023 levels. These unofficial 2024 amounts are determined using the Internal Revenue Code (IRC)’s cost-of-living adjustment methods, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) published Chained Consumer Price Index for all Urban Consumers (C-CPI-U) values through January 2023, and Mercer’s projected C-CPI-U values for February and March 2023. 

Revisions to this GRIST reflect BLS’s updated C-CPI-U values for April through December 2022, which exceeded previously published amounts. (C-CPI-U values are updated every quarter until they are finalized up to a year after initial publication.) The updates also reflect the initial January 2023 C-CPI-U value, which reflects significant inflation for the month. The new C-CPI-U values produce higher projections than Mercer’s previous estimates for some limits, as noted below.
 

The table below shows the projected HSA, HDHP and excepted-benefit HRA amounts for 2024, along with the 2023 and 2022 values for comparison. The HSA catch-up contribution limit is set by statute and hasn’t changed since 2009.

Affordable Care Act (ACA) out-of-pocket maximums are higher than projected amounts. As announced by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) in December 2022, the out-of-pocket maximums for nongrandfathered group health plans under the ACA — $9,450 for self-only and $18,900 for other coverages — are higher than the projected 2024 HDHP out-of-pocket maximums.
 

Related resources

Non-Mercer resources

• Premium adjustment percentage, maximum annual limitation on cost sharing, reduced maximum annual limitation on cost sharing and required contribution percentage for the 2024 benefit year (CMS, Dec. 12, 2022)

Mercer Law & Policy resources

• Summary of 2023 benefit-related cost-of-living adjustments (Jan. 25, 2023)
• 2023 quick benefit facts (Jan. 20, 2023)
• Two-year renewal of predeductible HDHP telehealth coverage now law (Jan. 11, 2023)
• Final rules ease restrictions on health reimbursement arrangements (June 14, 2019)

Other Mercer resources

• How to maximize HDHPs and HSAs to save costs, promote health and retain talent (March 17, 2022)
• HSAs: Saving for, and during, an emergency (May 14, 2020)
• Could free COVID-19 services sabotage your HSA? IRS just weighed in (March 12, 2020)
• HSA enrollment rises even as full-replacement strategies decline (Jan. 7, 2020)
• To treat or to prevent? That is (still) the HSA question (Jan. 7, 2020)