Notwithstanding finance unification of national health insurance in 2003, heath insurance premium has been levied on the groups of workplace-insured individuals and regionally-insured individuals separately.
Separate health insurance levying system causes many defects in national health insurance system such as
moral hazard of individuals and disparity between the group of workplace-insured individuals and the group
of regionally-insured individuals. This study indicates defects and directions for improvement in relation to
the current health insurance levying system for regionally-insured individuals.
The main points of this paper are as follows. First, the health insurance levying standard for
regionally-insured individuals needs to be simplified because it is too complicated in comparison with that
of workplace-insured individuals. Insurance premium for regionally-insured individuals is determined by the
premium charge score calculated in household unit whereas insurance premium for workplace-insured
individuals is determined by the level of income. Health insurance levying system for regionally-insured
individuals is overly complicated and causes complaints. In addition, it takes a lot of administration costs
for health insurance corporation to collect insurance premium. Second, The current separate levying system
impedes the equity of the premium burden between the group of workplace-insured individuals and the
group of regionally-insured individuals. Therefore the current separate levying system should be reformed
into unifying it in the long term. As a concrete method of unification, it is necessary to examine how to
impose health insurance premium on the basis of income tax and property tax. Third, the current dependent
system undermines the equity of the national health insurance system since the dependents of
workplace-insured individuals don't need to pay insurance premium at all while they can enjoy all the
benefits of national health insurance. Thus, the supporting and income requirement for acknowledging
dependents should be tightened to reduce free riders. Fourth, the current grading system of income and
property for regionally-insured individuals is regressive and lacks logical validity. The grading rule should
be changed into proportionate one at least and the disparity between income and property should be
resolved. Fifth, the levying system of basic insurance premium for all individuals including dependents may
be introduced as a method to mitigate disparity between the group of workplace-insured individuals and the
group of regionally-insured individuals.