OPEN MINDS The Behavioral Health & Social Service Industry Analyst Industry News The Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI) has found that mental health care costs account for about 10% of employers’ health benefit costs and averaged $207 per employee in 1988. Employers’ mental health care costs rose 27% between 1987 and 1988 (when all other medical costs rose 18.6%), according to a summary of the EBRI  report that appeared in the March, 1990 issue of Alcohol And Drug Abuse Pulse Beats.