Editors’ Picks

Short Term Disability Insurance and Pregnancy

By Bob Bland
Short Term Disability Insurance and Pregnancy

We get many request for short term disability insurance to cover maternity leave. Most of these requests are from women who have left a large employer, or are no longer working full-time, and are therefore not covered under a group short term disability policy (STD). They’re either already pregnant or considering becoming pregnant, and are looking for some disability coverage to provide income while out of work and on maternity leave. Unfortunately, normal child birth…

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Girls Tailgating Boys With High Auto Insurance Premiums

By Bill Hupp
Girls Tailgating Boys With High Auto Insurance Premiums

Conventional wisdom in the 20th century held that teenage boys were much more aggressive, riskier drivers than their female counterparts.

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Insurers Pummeled By Tough Season for Hail, Tornadoes and Ice Storms

By Todd Halterman
Insurers Pummeled By Tough Season for Hail, Tornadoes and Ice Storms

The first quarter of 2017 proved particularly rough on homeowners and property and casualty insurers. They were all hit with some seriously expensive losses thanks to hail, tornadoes and ice to the tune of more than a third of a billion dollars. First-quarter underwriting results for Travelers Cos. worsened year-over-year as catastrophe costs jumped 9 percent to $347 million, while Allstate Corp. and others also reported the effects of storm-related claims ahead of their earnings…

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The Horror of Tornado Damage and Homeowners Insurance Coverage

By Alexa Hyman
The Horror of Tornado Damage and Homeowners Insurance Coverage

Back in 2011, 362 tornadoes ravaged seven Southern states and those horrific twisters during that April killed more than 300, injured thousands more, leveled whole neighborhoods and reduced well-constructed homes to piles of rubble. Weather authorities are calling it the second worst natural disaster in the history of this country – following Hurricane Katrina in 2005 – and the deadliest U.S. tornado incident in 37 years. Insured losses are estimated at 2 billion to 5 billion dollars by risk…

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Shut It Down! The Healthcare Battle That Will Shut Down the US Government

By Todd Halterman
Shut It Down! The Healthcare Battle That Will Shut Down the US Government

Congress must pass a bill this week to keep most of the government running beyond Friday when a government spending bill runs out. It won’t be easy. The debate over a new spending bill focuses on an esoteric issue affecting the Affordable Care Act. The question is whether Congress will pass — and President Donald Trump will sign — a bill that also funds subsidies for lower-income people who purchase health insurance under the law….

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Latest Republican Proposals Aimed at Capping Medicaid Spending

By Todd Halterman
Latest Republican Proposals Aimed at Capping Medicaid Spending

Transitioning Medicaid from an unlimited entitlement program to limited block grants could save U.S. taxpayers more than $100 billion, or $803 per household, over the next five years, according to a study from the healthcare innovation research company Avalere. Block grants of fixed amounts to states would save $150 billion by 2022, the February analysis found. A per-capita block grant, which would increase or decrease with enrollment, would cut federal spending by $110 billion. In…

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Cyber Liability Poses Risks Not Covered By Ordinary Insurance

By Mike Mosser
Cyber Liability Poses Risks Not Covered By Ordinary Insurance

It’s all but impossible to do business today without computers and the Internet.  Even if a computer is used for nothing more than accounting and keeping track of orders, a data loss or equipment failure could mean economic hardship for any company. Throw in the use of email, a website or social media and a company’s risk exposure could be greater than that posed by the more physical threats of fire or other disasters—especially where…

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Drone Insurance? It’s Coming Your Way From Above

By Todd Halterman
Drone Insurance? It’s Coming Your Way From Above

New technologies are impacting many different industries – and have been as long as commerce has been taking place. Whether it be when JC Penny and Sears and Roebuck were selling products to gold miners in the 1850’s or when Henry Ford was selling the Model T in the first half of the 20th century, companies that adapt to technological change are the companies that succeed in the long term. At this time technological advances…

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Are Head-up Displays And Voice Command Technologies As Dangerous As Manual Texting While Driving

By Todd Halterman
Are Head-up Displays And Voice Command Technologies As Dangerous As Manual Texting While Driving

From drinking coffee to eating a donut to putting on makeup or touching up a morning shave, as drivers we’re often guilty of performing “secondary tasks” in our cars. As a result, there’s been an uptick in injuries – and even fatalities – directly tied to distracted driving. And now “wearable technologies” are coming under scrutiny as well. While it may seem at first glance that devices such as Google Glass, which include features such…

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Obamacare On the Brink of Failure in Tennessee’s Third Largest City

By Todd Halterman
Obamacare On the Brink of Failure in Tennessee’s Third Largest City

Could Knoxville, Tennessee be the first U.S. city where ObamaCare fails? Should that happen, it’s likely that more than 40,000 people there will be left without options to allow them to purchase a subsidized insurance policy. As it now stands, Humana is the only insurance provider available to consumers on the exchange there, and the company has already said they don’t plan to participate during 2018. In February, Humana issued a news release stating “based…

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