Empowering Informed Choice: Advancing Health Insurance Literacy in a Complex and Costly System

While economic uncertainty-driven by inflation, supply chain disruptions, and global instability-continues to place significant pressure on household budgets across the United States (Prosperity Now, 2025), these financial stresses are compounded by the persistently high cost of health care (Goforth, 2025).This elevated spending, which consistently exceeds international norms, results from deep, systemic flaws within the U.S. health care system.Policy-driven complexity and a fragmented administrative infrastructure are key contributors to these inefficiencies (Chernew & Mintz, 2021;Gee & Spiro, 2019), driving up prices and placing a substantial financial burden on consumers.These systemic inefficiencies are further compounded by the complexity of insurance plan structures, which increases the challenge of understanding coverage and avoiding unexpected costs.Given these systemic inefficiencies, enhancing health insurance literacy becomes a critical intervention.Health insurance literacy-the ability to understand and effectively navigate health insurance information-empowers individuals to make informed choices, reduce unexpected costs, and alleviate financial strain.Given the persistent issues of high health care costs and administrative complexity, improving health insurance literacy is not just advantageous but essential.Promoting greater literacy helps consumers better engage with the health care system, ultimately protecting their financial well-being.Achieving this goal requires coordinated efforts from policymakers, health care providers, educators, and community organizations, all of whom must work together to equip in-dividuals with the knowledge they need to make confident, informed decisions.