Close Close
Sign In
Newsletters
Popular Financial Topics Discover relevant content from across the suite of ALM legal publications From the Industry More content from ThinkAdvisor and select sponsors Investment Advisor Issue Gallery Read digital editions of Investment Advisor Magazine Tax Facts Get clear, current, and reliable answers to pressing tax questions
Luminaries Awards
Podcast Center Video Center Webcasts Resource Center Events
About ThinkAdvisor Contact Us Advertise With Us Asset & Logo Licensing Sitemap Terms of Service Privacy Policy Copyright © 2024 ALM Global, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
ThinkAdvisor

Life Health > Life Insurance

Hunter%3A Keep Group Life Out Of TRIA

By Arthur D. Postal

X
Your article was successfully shared with the contacts you provided.

The Consumer Federation of America is reminding Senate leaders that it wants them to kill, or at least scale back, the federal Terrorism Risk Reinsurance Act program.[@@]

The TRIA program, enacted in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorism attacks, is scheduled to expire Dec. 31. The current program provides limited federal protection for property-casualty insurers that face huge claims resulting from large terrorist attacks.

J. Robert Hunter, insurance director at the CFA, Washington, opposed the creation of TRIA and has been working since TRIA was enacted to keep Congress from extending it.

Now industry lobbyists doubt Congress can extend the program before mid-December, at the earliest.

Hunter and a colleague, Travis Plunkett, CFA’s legislative director, today sent letters repeating their opposition to TRIA extension to Senate Majority Leader William Frist, R-Tenn., and Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., as well as to the top Republican and the top Democrat on the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee.

Justifying terrorism insurance subsidies is impossible at a time when insurance profits are skyrocketing, commercial insurance rates are falling and federal budget deficits are growing, Hunter and Plunkett write.

“Do not add group life coverage to TRIA,” Hunter and Plunkett add. “Despite the Department of Treasury’s recommendation to reduce TRIA reimbursed lines, group life insurers are lobbying mightily for an expansion. There is no meaningful evidence that justifies expanding TRIA to cover group life insurance.”

Prices in the group life market are low and competition is strong, and group life insurers are not making enough use of private mechanisms for spreading risk, Hunter and Plunkett write.

NOT FOR REPRINT

© 2024 ALM Global, LLC, All Rights Reserved. Request academic re-use from www.copyright.com. All other uses, submit a request to [email protected]. For more information visit Asset & Logo Licensing.