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
Practice of selling those securities whose price has increased and retaining those securities whose price has declined. The securities that have declined are listed at their amortized value ...
Existence of a financial need which permits in-service withdrawals of funds from a section 401 (k) plan or a section 403 (b) plan to pay tuition for post secondary education for a ...
Provision in almost all excess of loss reinsurance contracts under which payment is made by a re insurer of each and every loss incurred by the cedent in excess of a specified sum, up to a ...
Programs that deal with troublesome personal and family problems such as alcohol and drug abuse, marital problems, workplace violence, compulsive gambling, child care, legal problems, and ...
System whereby the re insurer shares losses in the same proportion as it shares premium and policy amounts. Proportional reinsurance may be divided into the two basic forms: automatic ...
Health insurance that provides income payments to the insured wage earner when income is interrupted or terminated because of illness, sickness, or accident. Definitions under this ...
Detailed descriptive list made available to the survivor (s) of the insured showing: attorney, accountant, insurance agent, and location of important documents such as wills, power of ...
Insurance company that sells property and casualty insurance only to industrial insureds. These companies are separately licensed and separately capitalized to market insurance to cover the ...
Insurance that follows an insured property. ...
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