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
Report developed by or supplied by a credit agency to an insurer dealing with the financial standing and character of an insurance applicant. These factors are carefully weighted by the ...
Procedure in which a home office interviewer (who may or may not have underwriting experience) interviews applicants on the telephone. The questions asked the applicant are automated and ...
Type of disability income insurance that provides income payments to the wage earner when income is interrupted or terminated because of illness, sickness, or accident and can continue to ...
Policies that have their future cash values closely correlated with a high lapse ratio of the insurance company's book of business. In theory, gains resulting from these lapses will result ...
Clause in legal contracts that excuses a given party to the contract from liability for unintentional negligent acts and/or omissions. ...
Form of inland marine insurance under which an insured is indemnified for damage or destruction of his or her on-premises property if it is due to radioactive material stored or used within ...
Eligible rollover distribution that is paid directly from an employee's employee benefit insurance plan to the employee's individual retirement account (IRA) or to another plan maintained ...
Frequency with which employees resign, are fired, or retire from a company, usually computed as the percentage, of an organization's employees at the beginning of a calendar year. The ...
Arrangement in which individuals serve as trustees of their own living trust and name another party (successor trustee) to manage the assets if they should become incapacitated. In this ...
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