In case you were curious, yes, Insurance Journal is still publishing. IJ Midwest has been going well so far, though it’s a lot more work than I was doing before. It’s been a challenge, definitely.

Here’s a link to the Feb. 23 issue of IJ Midwest online, and here’s one for the March 8 issue. I’ve been busy working on a couple of longer stories that will appear in upcoming issues, so there’s not much by me in either of these issues, aside from the little editor’s note.

I did write a couple of news stories, though. One about a group of state legislators specializing in insurance affairs that moved to password-protect its Web site, much to chagrin of the self-appointed consumer representatives. And a second story concerns a Missouri insurance department study that claims to show that the practice of using credit scores in rating and underwriting discriminates against minorities and the poor.

Enjoy!

Here’s a chance to read one, anyhow. The Jan. 26 edition of Insurance Journal Midwest is now online.

I’ve got two articles in it: an interview with the Ohio commish, and a Midwest legislative preview. And there’s the always-clever editor’s note, of course.

Enjoy!

The long-rumored, much-labored-upon Midwest edition of Insurance Journal had its premiere last week. You can find the Jan. 12 issue online here. Of particular interest to the casual reader is the cover story on clout-heavy Chicago broker Mickey Segal, whose federal trial on charges of embezzling more than $20 million from his own brokerage begins in April.

Enjoy!

Here’s my latest story to become available online. It’s about a company that acts as a cooperative of agencies to help them get better contracts with the insurance companies they work for.

It’s quite innovative, actually. Meanwhile, I’ll be very hard at work this week finishing up stories and editing for the debut edition of Insurance Journal Midwest, coming out Jan. 12. It will be a challenge, but it should be well worth it. The cover story for this first issue is quite a catch, I think, and hopefully will help make a name for our magazine here in the heartland.

Here’s my latest Insurance Journal story to become available online: “Insurers question NAIC budget reserves.”

The NAIC (National Association of Insurance Commissioners) is an interesting organization. It’s a private, quasi-governmental organization that charges a fee in the thousands to file their annual statement, which is required by every state insurance department.

Then it charges anybody who wants to get that data back out of the system additional, exorbitant fees. Nice gig if you can get it. And when they take in too much money in fees they say they need it for reserves. And the insurers complain. But the difference is now that the industry’s starting to think, as sources have told me, they’d rather deal with one gorilla (the feds) than 50 monkeys.

I doubt the trade would work out very well, but they’re using that threat as leverage to get the state regulators to be more friendly, since federal regulation would remove a $12 billion annual stream of income the states get from taxing insurance premiums.

And the beat goes on.

The high-quality insurance reporting just keeps coming:

• NAII, Alliance aim to merge by Jan. 1
• NAII’s annual meeting features celebrity speakers, wheeling and dealing (talk about hard-hitting!)

Ever wonder why people keep building big fancy houses right next to natural tinderboxes like the forests of Southern California? Because the state government’s residual market insurance program makes sure their coverage is cheap, cheap, cheap, as Matt Welch explains cogently.

So, not only do the rest of the state’s insurance consumers pay for this below-market cost insurance, but the residents pay because they are kept ignorant of the true costs of where they choose to reside. If you distort the price, you distort the information.

Here’s a brief story I wrote for the magazine with some background about the decision to go national.

It recaps the rationale behind the publisher’s move on business and editorial grounds.

Here are a couple of stories resulting from my reporting at the National Association of Insurance Commissioners conference this week in Chicago.

• NAIC intends to modernize
• Study on scoring’s disparate impact tabled

I can’t say the meetings were exciting, exactly. It was as about as bureaucratic as it gets.

You’ve heard all about it, and now my long unawaited monster on surplus lines is finally here!

Ain’t ya glad?