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Full-Text Articles in Law
The Harmonization Of European Contract Law: The Case Of Insurance Contracts, Juan Bataller Grau
The Harmonization Of European Contract Law: The Case Of Insurance Contracts, Juan Bataller Grau
Connecticut Insurance Law Journal
The harmonization of European Contract Law for consumers and businesses continues to progress; however, without some standardization of the insurance contract, it will be difficult to achieve a true single market. This Article chronicles the European Union’s activities towards this goal, including the role of the Principles of European Insurance Contract Law, which provides a set of model rules for European legislators. The Article also analyzes: (i) the appropriate legal nature of the instrument of European Contract Law; (ii) the scope of that legal instrument (e.g. whether the instrument should cover both cross-border and domestic contracts, and whether it should …
An Affordable Care Act For Retirement Plans?, Amy B. Monahan
An Affordable Care Act For Retirement Plans?, Amy B. Monahan
Connecticut Insurance Law Journal
In the United States, the availability of tax subsidies for retirement savings is largely based on an individual’s employment status and whether such individual’s employer has voluntarily chosen to offer a tax-favored savings vehicle. Even where an individual has access to an employer-sponsored retirement plan, such plans are too often suboptimally designed. This article proposes an incremental reform that ensures universal access to tax-favored retirement savings irrespective of employment status or employer decisions. Borrowing from the model of the Affordable Care Act, the article calls for the creation of an optional, universally available retirement plan, which would be designed according …
Retirement Policies And Related Social Changes In The Lifecycle, Russell K. Osgood
Retirement Policies And Related Social Changes In The Lifecycle, Russell K. Osgood
Connecticut Insurance Law Journal
This Essay argues that retirement policies, including retirement income and healthcare sufficiency, should be crafted in light of demographic and lifestyle changes rather than as a means to solve a larger fiscal problem. The author studies work force demographics and life expectancy in the decades following WWII as compared to today and discusses how other nations have attempted to solve the same problems currently facing the United States. As a means of addressing the increasing fiscal demands of paying for retirement, the article proposes an “omnibus” plan that extends the retirement age, introduces “means testing” for certain benefits as well …
Reinsurance As Governance: Governmental Risk Management Pools As A Case Study In The Governance Role Played By Reinsurance Institutions, Marcos Antonio Mendoza
Reinsurance As Governance: Governmental Risk Management Pools As A Case Study In The Governance Role Played By Reinsurance Institutions, Marcos Antonio Mendoza
Connecticut Insurance Law Journal
Scholars have eloquently detailed the “Insurance as Governance” concept, the potential capacity for reinsurer regulatory influence on insurers, and the many aspects under which these theories may arise. This Article takes the next step in analyzing the complex reinsurer-insurer relationship through empirical research into how carriers are actually influenced by reinsurers, and what effect this has on the parties. As a case study in the governance role played by reinsurance institutions, this Article organizes survey interview responses of senior officials in the governmental entity self-insured risk management pool sector into four distinct discussion areas: (i) how reinsurers influence pools in …
Information & Equilibrium In Insurance Markets With Big Data, Peter Siegelman
Information & Equilibrium In Insurance Markets With Big Data, Peter Siegelman
Connecticut Insurance Law Journal
Asymmetric information makes the behavior of insurance markets very difficult to predict. But this Article argues that the increasing use of Big Data by insurers will not result in forecasts of loss that are so accurate that they eliminate uncertainty, and with it, the possibility of insurance. Big Data techniques might lead to a “flip” in informational asymmetry, resulting in a situation in which insurers know more about their customers than the latter know about themselves. But the effects of such a development could actually be benign. Finally, the Article considers the potential for Big (or at least, More) Data …
Medical Big Data And Big Data Quality Problems, Sharona Hoffman
Medical Big Data And Big Data Quality Problems, Sharona Hoffman
Connecticut Insurance Law Journal
Medical big data has generated much excitement in recent years and for good reason. It can be an invaluable resource for researchers in general and insurers in particular. This Article, however, argues that users of medical big data must proceed with caution and recognize the data’s considerable limitations and shortcomings. These include data errors, missing information, lack of standardization, record fragmentation, software problems, and other flaws. This Article analyzes a variety of data quality problems and then formulates recommendations to address these deficiencies, including data audits, workforce and technical solutions, and regulatory approaches.
Payment Protection Insurance (Ppi) Misselling: Some Lessons From The Uk, Andromachi Georgosouli
Payment Protection Insurance (Ppi) Misselling: Some Lessons From The Uk, Andromachi Georgosouli
Connecticut Insurance Law Journal
The misselling of Payment Protection Insurance (“PPI”) is a longstanding problem in the UK. The Treating Customers Fairly (“TCF”) initiative was introduced to tackle this problem but, despite its sophisticated inception, its effectiveness has been limited. This Article canvasses the main features of TCF as a management-based approach to regulation and highlights its initial appeal. Against this backdrop, it draws on the recent UK experience with recurring instances of PPI misselling to offer an account of the principal causes of its shortcomings in the retail financial sector. It argues that the perceived failure of this regulatory approach may be attributed …
Fortuity Victims And The Compensation Gap: Re-Envisioning Liability Insurance Coverage For Intentional And Criminal Conduct, Erik S. Knutsen
Fortuity Victims And The Compensation Gap: Re-Envisioning Liability Insurance Coverage For Intentional And Criminal Conduct, Erik S. Knutsen
Connecticut Insurance Law Journal
Insurance is based on the notion that only uncertain, or fortuitous, losses are insurable. There are systemic problems, however, with the consistency in which fortuity clauses are applied in the liability insurance context. Differing interpretive approaches and litigation distortions include the use of at least three interpretive perspectives and two substantive requirements to interpret the intentional act fortuity clause, and four interpretive perspectives to interpret the criminal act fortuity clause. These problems stem from the tension between the two purposes of liability insurance (wealth protection and victim compensation) coupled with a move from explanatory rhetoric about fortuity to explanatory rhetoric …
Minding The Gap: Seeking Autism Coverage In Class Actions When State And Federal Laws Fail, Danielle M. Jaffee
Minding The Gap: Seeking Autism Coverage In Class Actions When State And Federal Laws Fail, Danielle M. Jaffee
Connecticut Insurance Law Journal
This Note examines the recent trend towards class actions to challenge insurers’ denial of autism treatment coverage. The author examines how state and federal laws regarding insurance coverage of autism treatment creates a gap allowing insurers to deny coverage, even in spite of the overwhelming proof of the beneficial nature of autism treatment for autistic individuals. Past individual challenges of insurers’ actions gave little guidance to consumers about the legal obligations of insurers for autism treatment and recent collective action has done little to provide more. The author examines the decisions of three courts determining the certification of class challenges …
Towards A Universal Framework For Insurance Anti-Discrimination Laws, Ronen Avraham, Kyle D. Logue, Daniel Schwarcz
Towards A Universal Framework For Insurance Anti-Discrimination Laws, Ronen Avraham, Kyle D. Logue, Daniel Schwarcz
Connecticut Insurance Law Journal
Discrimination in insurance is principally regulated at the state level. Surprisingly, there is a great deal of variation across coverage lines and policyholder characteristics in how and the extent to which risk classification by insurers is limited. Some statutes expressly permit insurers to consider certain characteristics, while other characteristics are forbidden or limited in various ways. What explains this variation across coverage lines and policyholder characteristics? Drawing on a unique, hand-collected data-set consisting of the laws regulating insurer risk classification in fifty-one U.S. jurisdictions, this Article argues that much of the variation in state-level regulation of risk classification can in …
Big Data And Insurance Symposium, George Jepsen
Big Data And Insurance Symposium, George Jepsen
Connecticut Insurance Law Journal
This Article reproduces the keynote address delivered by Connecticut Attorney General George Jepsen at the University of Connecticut School of Law’s Spring 2014 Big Data and Insurance Symposium. In his address, Attorney General Jepsen describes the opportunities and challenges associated with the use of big data technologies. He stresses the need to consider personal privacy concerns at every step of the data collection and analysis processes. Moreover, he argues that self-policing is not enough and that it is vital for the government to play a role in defining and enforcing individual privacy protections. Attorney General Jepsen concludes by calling for …
Towards A European Supervisory Authority, Javier Vercher-Moll
Towards A European Supervisory Authority, Javier Vercher-Moll
Connecticut Insurance Law Journal
Regulation (EU) no. 1094/2010, which established a European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority, may involve a major change to the management and supervision of private insurance in Spain and in the European Union. Thus, this Article analyzes the evolution from the original Insurance Committee, which boasted only advisory functions, to this new Authority, which has been given decision-making functions in addition to its advisory ones. The Article concludes by suggesting that in the future, this new Authority will be the sole supervisory body operating in all Member States, demonstrating a progression towards a new conception of supervision and regulation of …
Revenue Sharing In 401(K) Plans: Employers As Monitors?, Dana M. Muir
Revenue Sharing In 401(K) Plans: Employers As Monitors?, Dana M. Muir
Connecticut Insurance Law Journal
This article presents a discussion of the use of revenue sharing by mutual funds and 401(k) plan service providers. The author engages in a historical exploration of how revenue sharing has been used in 401(k) plans and highlights how regulators have taken an increased interest in ensuring disclosure of fund monies diverted for revenue sharing purposes. In addition, the article discusses how the current federal regulatory framework for employee benefits has not adapted to the increased use of 401(k) plans. The author challenges how ERISA places the burden of monitoring compensation to service providers on the employers who make the …
Risk Classification’S Big Data (R)Evolution, Rick Swedloff
Risk Classification’S Big Data (R)Evolution, Rick Swedloff
Connecticut Insurance Law Journal
Insurers can no longer ignore the promise that the algorithms driving big data will offer greater predictive accuracy than traditional statistical analysis alone. Big data represents a natural evolutionary advancement of insurers trying to price their products to increase their profits, mitigate additional moral hazard, and better combat adverse selection. But these big data promises are not free. Using big data could lead to inefficient social and private investments, undermine important risk-spreading goals of insurance, and invade policyholder privacy. These dangers are present in any change to risk classification. Using algorithms to classify risk by parsing new and complex data …
A Jurisprudential Survey Of Bad Faith Claims In The Workers' Compensation Context And A Call For A Unified Statutory Remedy, Steven Plitt
A Jurisprudential Survey Of Bad Faith Claims In The Workers' Compensation Context And A Call For A Unified Statutory Remedy, Steven Plitt
Connecticut Insurance Law Journal
No abstract provided.
Annuity Coeptis: Is There A Way To Avoid American Equity Investment Life Insurance Co. V. Sec Becoming A Herald For The Sec Gaining Regulatory Control Over All Securities-Related Insurance Products?, Russell Hasan
Connecticut Insurance Law Journal
No abstract provided.