Should antitrust principles be used to assess insurance residual market mechanisms, such as New York's medical malpractice insurance plan?
State-created insurance residual market mechanisms are typically designed to address flaws in markets in which a significant number of purchasers have difficulty obtaining affordable insurance; such programs, however, have often led to crises in such markets, and occasionally to economic catastrophe. (1) In this Paper, particular attention will be...

Security Arrangements. (Workers' Comp).
To ensure the payment of workers' compensation benefits to injured workers and/or their dependents, state legislatures have enacted provisions detailing how coverage is to be secured. These laws generally require employers to satisfy their obligations under the law through either the presence of insurance or through qualifying for self-insurance....

The insurance entrepreneur.
"Everyone who believes in the normal distribution of risk will be destroyed if she or he lives long enough," so a property/casualty actuary told me recently. Readers, take heed. We are in a balmy season of the market where it is difficult for a workers' compensation insurer...

No end in sight: workers' comp faces an uphill struggle. (Workers' Comp).
Inadequate pricing, a struggling economy, rising medical inflation and a growing residual market continue to drive up workers' comp premiums. With little hope for change in the immediate future, employers and insurers must work together to curtail rising costs and claims. For most employers workers' compensation is...

Farmers insurance to leave N.C. homeowners market.
Farmers Insurance Group said it will stop writing homeowners insurance in North Carolina because it risks paying out about double what it collects in premium in the state. Company spokesman Jerry Davies said Farmers has notified the North Carolina Department of Insurance and agents in the state...

Patrick plans to review auto insurance system.
Byline: David Weber BOSTON - Gov. Deval L. Patrick plans to comprehensively review the state auto insurance system after the acting insurance commissioner yesterday suspended rules changes made in the system during the final weeks of the Romney administration. On Dec. 13, then-Insurance Commissioner Julianne...

WC outlook improving 'somewhat': NCCI: Metrics improve but the line is still unprofitable for many carriers.
Workers' compensation continues to be a market in transition, The latest industry news reported by the National Council on Compensation Insurance nearly mirrors the previous year's report. Once again, the combined ratio and injury frequency were down, and the residual market was at least stable. However, interest rates remained...

AG walks away from AIG.
After looking at the February settlement on AIG's failure to pay its full state workers' compensation assessments in years past, I come away with the feeling that New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer may have left a very large sum of money on the table. So much, in fact,...

Getting it done: in the current hard market--which isn't expected to end anytime soon--the excess and surplus lines industry believes it's doing some of its "best work". (Excess & Surplus).
Insurance market prospects looked rosy for risk managers in January 2001. A panel of insurance industry analysts and chief executive officers at the Property and Casualty Joint Industry Forum predicted an abbreviated cycle. The hard market, they forecasted, would not last beyond the second quarter of 2001. The consensus...

The challenge for workers' comp. (Workers' Comp).
Costs in the workers' comp area are rising rapidly, and the risk of catastrophic losses has increased since our nation came under attack on September 11. here are some tips for surviving in this environment. The workers' compensation insurance industry--unprofitable even before the decline in capital caused...