Tax Equity And Financial Responsibility Acts Of 1982 And 1983 (TEFRA)
Legislation that redefined life insurance and raised taxes on life insurance companies. Among the provisions were new rules for some life insurance products, including a definition of flexible premium life insurance, and an increase in life insurance company taxes. Congress was concerned that a policyholder could take a substantial amount, say $1 million, and, after putting a few dollars toward a life insurance premium, put the remainder into a tax-free investment vehicle. One of two tests had to be satisfied for a policy to qualify as life insurance: the cash surrender value policy could not exceed a net single premium, and the death benefit had to represent a certain percentage of the cash value, which declined as the policy-holder got older. For example, at age 40, the death benefit must be 140% of cash value. The second rule closed a loophole on tax-free withdrawals from annuities. Prior to 1982 annuity holders could withdraw their initial premium tax free at any time. The 1982 code decreed that any money withdrawn from an annuity would be considered income first and would therefore be taxable. The older 1959 tax code devised a shorthand formula for determining taxes paid by insurers. The formula worked when interest rates were low, but as they soared, insurers found ways to reduce the increased tax bite. The 1982 code introduced a stopgap measure designed to raise taxes on life insurers by $3 billion.
Popular Insurance Terms
Company owned by its policy owners; no stock is available for purchase on the stock exchanges. ...
Local life insurance office that sells and services ordinary life insurance as well as other forms of life insurance except debt insurance. ...
Term used in the reinsuring of disability income insurance policies in that, after an extended period of time expires (in addition to the elimination period found in the disability income ...
Something that cannot be changed. In life insurance, a beneficiary who has been named as irrevocable cannot be changed without his or her formal (written) permission. ...
Same as term Fixed Dollar Annuity: annuity that guarantees that a specific sum of money will be paid in the future, usually as monthly income, to an annuitant. For example, a $1000-a-month ...
Basis for calculating life insurance premiums and benefits using current interest and mortality rates, rather than historic rates. Current assumptions are critical to interest-sensitive ...
Payment to a broker, master general agent, general agent, or agent on any particular line of insurance written by other agents within a particular geographical area. ...
Actuarial method of calculating benefits and their costs for all the employees as a group rather than for each individual employee. The costs of the benefits are measured in the form of a ...
Policy similar to that of an individual universal life insurance policy except that the coverage is provided (up to a limit) without the requirement of the submission of evidence of ...
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