State Supervision And Regulation
Primary responsibility for overseeing the insurance industry that has rested with individual states since 1945, after Congress passed the MCCARRAN-FERGUSON ACT (PUBLIC LAW 15). In addition to supervision and regulation, states receive taxes and fees paid by the industry that amount to several billion dollars a year. State insurance laws are administered by state insurance departments that are responsible for making certain that (1) rates are adequate, not unfairly discriminatory, and not unreasonably high, and (2) insurance companies in the state are financially sound and able to pay future claims. To this end, states set requirements for company reserves, require annual financial statements, and examine company books. Each state has an insurance commissioner or superintendent who is either elected or appointed by the governor, with responsibility for investigating company practices, approving rates and policy forms, and ordering liquidation of insolvent insurers. The NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF INSURANCE COMMISSIONERS (NAIC) has drafted model legislation and worked for policy uniformity, but regulations vary widely from state to state.
Whether insurers should be regulated by the states or the federal government remains at issue, but so far insurers and the NAIC lobbying have been effective in resisting federal regulation. Nevertheless, the federal government has a profound effect on the insurance industry through its taxes and a variety of regulations.
Popular Insurance Terms
Legislation providing that, to the extent that all deductible medical care expenses exceed 7.5% of the taxpayer's adjusted gross income (AGI), expenses not reimbursed under qualified ...
Life insurance policy provision under which the policyholder may apply the accumulated cash value, in the form of a single premium payment, to pay up the policy or to mature the policy as ...
Initial reserve plus the terminal reserve divided by two for any year of valuation. ...
Term used in the reinsuring of disability income insurance policies in that, after an extended period of time expires (in addition to the elimination period found in the disability income ...
Offset or subtraction of Social Security benefits from earned benefits in a qualified pension plan to reduce a pension benefit. Many business firms offset their pension payments by the ...
Procedure, in insurance, used in time series analysis to smooth out irregularities in projections of loss expectations. Irregularities to be smoothed out include: loss experience that is ...
Estimate of the funds necessary to maintain the life-style of a family after the death of the wage earner. ...
Additional hazard associated with aeronautics other than that of being a passenger on a regularly scheduled airline. An extra premium is charged, and/or there are usually exclusions applied ...
Clause in the Standard Fire Policy and many other property insurance policies that excepts coverage for losses caused by riot or civil commotion. Coverage for riot and civil commotion can ...
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