President Obama announced that he will change the HHS rule on ObamaCare that would require Catholic institutions to offer contraceptive coverage in direct contradiction to the church’s religious doctrines.

The Catholic Church, and many liberals and conservatives, voiced great dissatisfaction with the law, citing an affront to the First Amendment, which forbids the federal government from infringing on a religion’s right to freely practice.

The president said that in cases where religious non-profit organizations have objections, the health carriers who insure each church’s employees will be required to make contraceptive coverage available to those employees directly. And that contraceptive coverage must be offered at no charge.

The responsibility to make the contraception coverage to employees of religious institutions fall, therefore, on the shoulders of the insurance companies.

In essence, the federal government is still requiring the church to be involved in the offering of birth control coverage through a third party…sort of an “end run.” Catholic Church teaching prohibits the use of birth control and sterilization, including the controversial “morning-after” pill, which many consider a form of abortion.

Is this just a roundabout way of Mr. Obama still ensuring that contraception and birth control measures are offered to employees of religious institutions in opposition to their beliefs, or is this a legitimate compromise?

Other questions beg an answer, such as:

If the president is requiring insurers to offer the coverage free of charge — meaning that the cost cannot be added to the premiums — who will pay for this “free” coverage?

How will insurers manage that portion of the population that works for all of the nation’s non-profit religious organizations — which could number in he hundreds of thousands if not millions — that must be segregated from the general population; and how much manpower and resources will be required to manage this separate segment?

Since managing this population, marketing to it, etc., will cost money, how will those costs work into the new laws requirements for MLR’s (medical loss ratios), which are the costs above and beyond the actual cost of care and capped by the government? Will those costs be exempted from the MLR requirements?

Where does the president get the authority to order an insurance company — or any business, for that matter — to offer its products at no cost?

What if a large employer with several thousand employees is owned by a devout religious follower, will that owner be able to claim similarly that his or her religious rights are being violated by being forced to offer the coverage, thus making the owner eligible for an exemption, as well?

It seems that the president, with this new ruling, has turned a hot topic into a raging inferno.

As a direct result of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) – also known as ObamaCare – health insurance agent and broker commissions have been slashed by as much as 50%. Agencies have been forced to lay off employees, limit products and services, shift to other lines, and have seen significant drops in compensation.

IFAwebnews.com reported on a bi-partisan bill in the House and a new bi-partisan bill in the Senate that were introduced to exclude agent commissions from the medical loss ratio (MLR) portion of the law that has harmed so many agencies.

However, despite these bi-partisan attempts, Health and Human Services continues to ignore the pleas of agent groups and the NAIC to fix this deny fixing this portion of the law that harms the insurance agent profession, thereby denying expertise to consumers and businesses. More of this entry »

[UPDATE: ObamaCare rules changed to make insurers ‘bad guys’ in Catholic furor]

A firestorm is brewing as leaders of the Catholic Church in the U.S. react to a decision by the Obama Administration that there will be no exemption for church-owned hospitals, universities, social service organizations, homeless shelters and soup kitchens from certain provisions in the new federal health insurance law. Among issues the Catholic Church opposes is the requirement that the church must provide health insurance to its workers that includes contraceptive drugs and services, in direct contradiction to Catholic teaching. More of this entry »

The experts (meaning those who know a heck of a lot more than I do) have looked at some figures and peered into their crystal balls, and if what they see in the life insurance and financial services sectors is more than just a hiccup, we might see some good trends. More of this entry »

If Obamacare comes into full force in 2014, it is my firm belief that the economic hardships our country is experiencing now will pale in comparison. Dare I say that a second Great Depression could be the result?

Some will say my claims are just too fantastic. But already we are seeing companies preparing to throw their employees off of their own insurance plans in anticipation of state health exchanges, subsidized by the federal government. Wal-Mart, the world’s largest employer, announced recently that it will no longer offer health insurance to part-time workers. My crystal ball shows me that before 2014, most of Wal-Mart’s employees will therefore be part-time, including those moved from full- to part-time status. The result? We taxpayers will foot most of their health insurance costs.

States are unable to shoulder the cost of creating the state health exchanges as required under Obamacare. And when the floodgates open and employers across the nation dump their employees by the tens of millions onto the subsidized exchanges – remember, these workers who lose their employers health coverage are still required by law to purchase insurance, much of which will be subsidized – the state systems that are already at the breaking point will simply implode. By the dozens states will go bankrupt, millions more will go unemployed while still required to have health insurance, and an economic disaster will result. More of this entry »

With the federal estate tax exclusion at $5 million through 2012, a vast number of estates will not incur any federal tax. Even if the exclusion drops back to the $1 million dollar limit in 2013, the majority of estates will have little or no federal estate tax liability.

On the surface, it would seem there’s little need to do estate planning for many clients, particularly if it’s clear that their estate will not require a federal estate tax payment.

This is only part of the overall story, however. To ignore estate planning can be a huge mistake since there is a long list of estate settlement costs will have to be paid regardless of the size of the estate. And life insurance is still the best way to cover these expenses.

More of this entry »

Across the pond in Great Britain, pet insurance fraud has become a major problem, with one insurer reporting a 440% increase in suspect or proven pet insurance fraud claims since 2008.

Read more at Dogster.com.

If you like political theater, chaos, confusion and upheaval, mark your calendars now for late June. In the most important courtroom in the nation, the U.S. Supreme Court is expected to issue its ruling on whether President Barack Obama‘s Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is constitutional in late June.

That decision, based on prior court rulings and oral arguments slated for March, will most likely hinge on the legality of the individual mandate, the provision in the law that forces Americans, starting in January 2014, to either buy health insurance or face a fine.

My prediction a year ago that the Supreme Court’s PPACA ruling will become this generation’s Rowe versus Wade stands, for just about everyone has taken a side on the matter.

More of this entry »

Whoever said, “Many people look forward to the New Year for a new start on old habits,” may have got it right. While beginning a new year may be little more than a faint line in the sand, it can be useful for adjusting old business habits and assumptions in light of changing conditions and new opportunities.

While most future gazing is only slightly less successful than trying to understand teenage behavior, here are four significant signposts that deserve life insurance brokers’ attention in the year ahead:

1. More consumers are paying attention to their future. As a recent Forbes’ report points out, “With the economy in the state of flux, consumers are being understandably conservative in using their credit cards.”

More of this entry »

The Obama Administration, which actually means Barack Obama and those hoping to earn a second term with him at the White House, appear to be willing to chip away at their health reform law in order to stay in power.

How else can they explain the decision to allow states greater power in defining the essential benefits to be included in their health exchanges. The announcement of the change came in the week before the Christmas holiday, a traditional slow period for the mainstream media. In other words, the White House hoped few would pay attention to the decision.

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA), the federal health care reform, passed in March 2010 when a Democratic majority ruled, forces health insurance plans that offer coverage in the individual and small-group markets, inside and outside of the health exchanges, to offer essential health benefits, a comprehensive package of items and services.

Obama’s play is to show states, which don’t vote, and their residents, who vote, that he’s flexible with the health reform law, and that he and his minions at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, tasked with implementing most of the key components of health reform, are not inflexible.

Just before the vote on the PPACA in March 2010, then House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) told Democrats under her leadership in the House of Representatives to vote for health reform – even if it cost them their jobs. They listened, they voted for the law, and many of them, including Pelosi, lost their jobs. More will probably lose their jobs in November, when Republicans remind voters again that they supported the law.

Now, Obama is deviating from the plan. He appears willing to sacrifice parts of the health reform law, subject to more than 20 federal challenges, including one that will be decided by the U.S. Supreme Court next summer, if he can win a second term in office.

As the election draws closer and his chances of re-election continue decrease, how much more of his signature law will he be willing to sacrifice to remain at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue? There’s no telling.