Is the federal crop insurance program keeping up with climate change?

Crop insurance - A person touching wheat

Few changes have been made in the program despite rising risks associated with global warming. Risk has always been a part of farming, particularly due to its dependence on the weather in any given season or year, and crop insurance has become a key part of the survival of many farms across the United States. That said, risks associated with weather have been changing, but the program has altered very little. The massive federal crop insurance program has helped farmers to ensure their businesses survive in times of flooding, drought,…

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CHIP funding will run dry in several states by the end of January

child kid CHIP funding

Kids in many places across the country and whose families have low incomes will be without health insurance. CHIP funding was allowed to expire on September 30, 2017 and, despite the fact that the program has bipartisan support, it still has not been renewed. States have been doing what they could to compensate for the medical expenses without federal money. Unfortunately, some states haven’t fared as well as others. Now, many of the 9 million children enrolled in the program, as well as pregnant mothers and babies born over the…

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Insurance news from Congress shows repairs coming to capital rules

terrorism insurance news program law

There are a number of changes that are lined up to occur throughout this week to fix the current situation. Lawmakers from the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives are making insurance news as they prepare to tackle a law, this week, that will help to provide greater relief to large insurers against tight capital rules that had been designed with banks and other similar financial institutions in mind. This repair has been nicknamed the Collins Amendment to the reform law, 2010 Dodd-Frank Wall Street. This insurance news could mean…

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National Flood Insurance expiration delayed until January, legislators still slow to act

There seems to be no resolution in sight for the troubles plaguing the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP). The program, which provides thousands of homeowners with affordable flood insurance coverage, is scheduled to expire on December 18, but legislators have yet to make an attempt to fix what has been called by insurance professionals a broken system. NFIP has stood before Congress for several months now through a series of imminent expirations. Thus far, legislators have done little else beyond voting to extend the program for another month, but that…

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S&P claims top insurance companies could lose leading ratings

Standard & Poor’s recently announced that the top insurers in the country may lose their leading credit ratings as a result of the debates that have raised the federal debt ceiling. Affected insurance companies could include New York Life Insurance and the Texas-based USAA, as well as the Teachers Insurance & Annuity Association of America, Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Co., and Knights of Columbus.  Standard & Poor’s stated that each of these insurers risk losing their AAA credit ratings. The S&P statement said that the cause is the “significant holdings”…

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