‘In The News’ Archives
California Tries to Guide the Way on Health Law
California, more than any other state, is at the forefront of preparations for the roll out of the Affordable Care Act in January 2014 when a controversial requirement that most Americans have medical coverage or pay a penalty takes effect. “We are the example,” said Anthony Wright, executive director of Health Access California, an advocacy [...]
“New School” Retirement Planning for Today’s Baby Boomers
There's a new book e-book on the market, Bifurcated Retirement, The New Approach for Today's Baby Boomers. This book examines the Baby Boomers' unique retirement planning challenges regarding savings, investments, inflation, longevity, and long-term care needs, and delivers a two-stage retirement program not found in the traditional wealth [...]
Annuity Contributions Limits Annoy Investors
A recent report said one of the top reasons people were buying annuities was guaranteed income. But it turns out that the definition of guaranteed may vary. As of Friday, Prudential Annuities has suspended the ability of policyholders with 14 types of benefits to make further contributions. And because the size of the annuity payment is based on [...]
Health Insurance Costs Growing at Half the Rate of Last Year
The average cost for a family plan obtained through an employer jumped this year to $15,745 from $15,073 in 2011, when premiums rose 9.5 percent according to the Kaiser Family Foundation after surveying more than 2,000 companies. Premiums, a cost typically shared by employers and employees, have doubled in the past decade, three times the gains [...]
Supervision Lacking at Broker-Dealers: NASAA
State regulators are seeing fewer problems with variable annuity sales but continue to see violations in some areas of supervision at broker-dealers. The top five types of violations: failure to follow written supervisory policies, suitability, correspondence/e-mail, maintenance of customer account information and internal audits, according to [...]
Information Technology is Driving Force for Improving Healthcare
Recent developments in the transformation of the healthcare system were addressed by national speakers at the MedeAnalytics Fall 2012 Client Summit in Sonoma, a gathering of healthcare executives from around the country. The featured speakers noted the key role analytics play in our nation's quest to improve the quality and lower the cost of [...]
Health Reform Law to Usher in Age of Consumerism
The health reform law will bring millions of new potential customers to insurers' doorsteps ushering in a new age of consumerism. New services, tools and communication strategies are being developed to attract and retain business. Health insurance companies will offer health coaching, online tools and medical information. They'll develop mobile [...]
Industry Experts Inaugurate National 401(k) Day
American workers' retirement confidence is at an all-time low, so industry experts are using National 401(k) Day as something to celebrate not just on one day, but all year long. The 2012 Retirement Confidence Survey by the Employee Benefit Research Institute says only 14 percent of the 1,262 respondents believe they will have enough money to [...]
New California Legislation to Fight Health Fraud
The California Legislature has introduced legislation that would increase the current annual surcharge on health and disability insurers from 10 cents per insured individual to 20 cents. Bill (AB 2138), by Assembly member Bob Blumenfield (D- Woodland Hills), will help increase funding to fight health and disability insurance fraud in the [...]
“Hospital of the Future” in San Diego
San Diego's Palomar Health opened its 288-bed "Hospital of the Future" – Palomar Medical Center, featuring several technologies from Cisco Systems. The largest health district in California. Cisco and Palomar built out a virtual hospital in Second Life starting in 2008 while preparing for the opening of the real-life facility in August. The [...]
