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
Documents completed by the agent to effect authorization to act on behalf of the company. ...
Same as term Credit Card Insurance: coverage under a homeowners insurance policy in the event that a credit card is fraudulently used or altered. Fraud includes theft and the unauthorized ...
Provision in an insurance policy that indicates what is denied coverage. For example, common exclusions are: hazards deemed so catastrophic in nature that they are uninsurable, such as war; ...
Insurance policy, particularly property and liability insurance, which the owner cannot assign to a third party. ...
Condition of real or personal property when it is damaged or destroyed to such an extent that it cannot be rebuilt or repaired to equal its condition prior to the loss. ...
An exception to section 101 (a) (1) OF THE INTERNAL REVENUE CODE tax-exempt Status Of the DEATH BENEFIT in a life insurance policy where the transfer of the interest in the policy by the ...
a large number of homogeneous exposures (in order for the deviation of actual losses from expected losses to approach zero, and thecreditability of the prediction to approach one). loss ...
Organization that calculates rates and develops insurance policies for its property and casualty member companies. The suggested rates are used by smaller companies where the loss ...
Arrangement between the buyer and the seller in which there is a mutual agreement to buy or sell a security at a given price at a stipulated future date. These contracts are effected on a ...
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