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
Use of new rate structures by an insurance company without first obtaining approval of a State Insurance Department. ...
Approach used for sole proprietorships, partnerships, and close corporations in which the business interests of a deceased or disabled proprietor, partner, or shareholder are sold according ...
Company that buys life insurance policies from policyowners on the lives of insureds who are terminally ill. This type of company pays cash for the life insurance policies, usually in the ...
Type of organization of property and casualty insurance companies whose objective is to share information on fraudulent claims, handle claims in an expeditious manner, and disseminate ...
Insurance for accountants covering liability lawsuits arising from their professional activities. For example, an investor bases a buying decision on the balance sheet of a company's annual ...
The definition of special acceptance explains how two insurance institutions work together for the benefit of the masses. In order to define what special acceptance means, we must ...
new dividend option under which the policyowner allows the dividends from the participating policy to be applied for the purposes of accumulating cash values. ...
Arrangement under which the insured pays a fixed premium to the insurance company in exchange for the total transfer of the risk to that company. ...
Legal document setting out the rules to be followed by a trustee in administering assets of a trust. The trust agreement may limit investment of trust assets to specified types of ...
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