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
Combination of contributions of many investors whose money is used to buy stocks, bonds, commodities, options, and/or money market funds, or precious metals such as gold, or foreign ...
Laws in most cases protecting life insurance policies from an insured's creditors. These laws typically exempt death benefit proceeds and policy cash values from attachment by creditors, ...
Right of a certificate holder to convert group life or group health insurance to an individual policy without a physical examination to furnish evidence of insurability. Usually this must ...
Number of individuals exposed to the risk of illness, sickness, and disease at each age, and the actual number of individuals who incurred an illness, sickness, and disease at each age. ...
Additional policy dividend paid to a life insurance policyholder when a policy terminates. A mutual insurance company is owned by its policyholders and writes participating policies, which ...
Wrongful inaction; failure to act; inactivity. ...
Policy in which an insurer agrees to pay property or liability losses in excess of a specific amount per occurrence. For example, this type of coverage typically is used by an employer that ...
Entity maintained by the Teachers Insurance Annuity Association. The fund essentially serves college faculties and staff, who pay premiums through salary deductions toward a tax-sheltered ...
Same as term Depositors Forgery Insurance: coverage provided for individuals or businesses for loss due to forgery or alteration of such financial instruments as notes, checks, drafts, and ...
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