Financial economists and fans of old murder mysteries know about tontines. Was the law too hasty in banning them? [Jeff Guo, Washington Post “WonkBlog”]
Posts Tagged ‘insurance’
Banking and finance roundup
- “Fee-shifting: Delaware’s self-inflicted wound” [Stephen Bainbridge, more] Needed: a new Delaware [Reuters] Fordham lawprof Sean Griffith fights trial bar on shareholder suits [Bainbridge, more]
- Goodbye, insurance (hugs). I think I’ll miss you most of all. [Bridget Johnson on anti-cinema, anti-stock-trading views of radical Islamist British activist and former lawyer Anjem Choudary]
- Rare coalition of bankers, housing advocates urges limits on mortgage-related suits [W$J]
- “The Administrative State v. The Constitution: Dodd-Frank at Five Years” hearing includes testimony from Mark Calabria of Cato (law delegates vast authority to bureaucracy, has failed to generate clear rules for regulated parties) and Neomi Rao of George Mason (unconstitutionality of Consumer Financial Protection Bureau) [Senate Judiciary Committee, related on a CFPB constitutional challenge]
- Do-it-yourself Operation Choke Point: letter from one Illinois sheriff shut down adult-ad credit card payments [Maggie McNeill, Daniel Fisher]
- “Obama DOJ Channels Bank Shakedown Money To Private Groups” [Dan Epstein, Investors Business Daily]
- “The U.S. listing gap” [Doidge, Karolyi, & Stulz NBER paper via Tyler Cowen, MR]
Legal uncertainty is a bummer
“Lloyd’s Stops Insuring Marijuana Firms Due to U.S. Law Conflicts” [Insurance Journal] Related: “Bipartisan Senate Bill Would Protect Banks That Do Business With Marijuana Merchants” [Jacob Sullum, Reason]
Oregon insurance bill would hamstring Uber, Lyft
Almost as if it were meant that way [Geoffrey Manne, Oregonian]
A Michigan forfeiture pattern
After crooks sell bogus insurance coverage to credulous Michigan auto owners, cops swoop down and seize/forfeit victims’ cars for having been operated without insurance. Crooks and cops, stronger together! [Juan Thompson, The Intercept]
Also on forfeiture: if you’re in the D.C. area mark your calendar for June 26 when I will be appearing at a Right on Crime panel discussion of the subject in downtown D.C. along with Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform and Jason Pye of FreedomWorks, with John Malcolm of Heritage moderating. You can register and see more details here.
Liability roundup
- “Judge dismisses Brady Center’s lawsuit. Ammo retailers not to blame for Aurora theater killer” [Denver Post via @davekopel]
- “Ever been in a crowded subway car when a gunfight broke out? I have.” And it relates to slip-fall cases [Eric Turkewitz]
- No more of Prosser’s tricks: Scalia warns modern Restatements “of questionable value, must be used with caution” [Orin Kerr]
- Impact of revelations in Garlock document trove continues to ripple: “Insurer Claims Asbestos Fraud Tainted Pittsburgh Corning Bankruptcy” [Daniel Fisher, Forbes, earlier]
- Trial lawyer allies want to make California’s insurer-shackling Prop 103 even (if possible) worse [Ian Adams, Insurance Journal, see also]
- “The settlement shakedown”: Scott Shackford on the Moonlight Fire case in California [Reason, earlier]
- This must be what they call a hellhole jurisdiction [comic book cover via Jim Dedman, Abnormal Use]
Lawmaker seeks ban on home-insurance “breed discrimination”
Home insurance companies often charge higher premiums to homeowners whose breeds of dog have a bad loss experience, and that practice is unfair and even “ridiculous,” thinks Connecticut lawmaker Brenda Kupchick (R-Fairfield). If “breed discrimination” is banned, and insurers instead pass the uncovered losses on to owners of other dog breeds or policyholders generally, that would not be unfair or ridiculous, right? [AP/Insurance Journal; David Moran, Hartford Courant (reg)]
The unfolding costs of FATCA
Today the expatriate-punishing tax law, rife with unintended consequences, expands its reach further into the insurance sector. [Frederic Garsson and David Shapiro, Saul Ewing]
“Liberty Mutual: Most Parents Lack Extra Coverage For Play Dates”
California Prop 46 and Prop 45
Besides Prop 46, which would massively raise the MICRA limit on noneconomic damages in medical liability cases and subject doctors to mandatory drug testing and other burdens — and which has been opposed by every large California newspaper as well as by the ACLU of California — there’s Prop 45, to intensify the state’s already extensive system of insurance rate regulation. Ian Adams warns against its faults at City Journal.