Many Oregonians to Face Higher Health Insurance Costs in 2025

Health insurance is about to get more expensive for many individuals and small businesses in Oregon following regulators’ Sept. 5 approvals of new rate hikes.

The 2025 increases will affect people who buy their own health insurance and small businesses employing 50 people or fewer. About 170,000 Oregonians will face premium increases.

The impact for individuals and small businesses by the numbers

Oregon residents who buy their health insurance through the state’s individual market can expect a premium increase of roughly 8% in 2025. And some options, like PacificSource Health Plans, received approval for an 11.1% increase.

This means a 40-year-old living in Portland will now have to pay $573 per month for Silver Coverage from PacificSource, the Oregon Division of Financial Regulation (DFR) said.

Silver Coverage provides mid-level health insurance benefits.

PacificSource cited increased medical and pharmaceutical costs as the reason for its filing an increase request.

The Kaiser Foundation Health Plan of the Northwest secured the smallest rate increase, for individual filers, at 5%. A 40-year-old living in Portland will pay a monthly premium of $486 for Silver Coverage from the Kaiser Foundation in 2025, according to DFR data.

Average rate approvals for the small business market were far more volatile, topping out with a 16.3% rate increase for Providence Health Plan. PacificSource secured the smallest rate increase for the small business market, at 5.7%.

Providence’s dramatic increase looks to keep the insurer in line with market prices. For comparison, a 40-year-old living in Portland will now pay $467 per month for coverage from Providence, compared to a monthly premium of $459 from PacificSource in 2025.

What’s next? Public input to rate reviews remains limited

The Division of Financial Regulation spent months reviewing insurers’ rate increase requests. In many cases, the DFR approved requested increases for small business health insurance without any changes. But it reduced individual market increases, approving hikes that are 1% less than what insurers requested.

Public input was also limited during this rate review period, with only a single public comment submitted to the division’s public comment portal.

“These rate increases are terrible,” the anonymous comment stated. “I already have many people who bail on the Marketplace because it is still too expensive for their income level. There will be more and more people who will go uninsured because of this.”

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