Insurers Critical of Several Obama Budget Proposals for 2011

Insurance industry associations have been looking over the details of President Barack Obama's 2011 budget proposal and not liking everything they find -- from new life industry rules to taxation of major companies to potential changes for offshore insurers.

In each of the next 10 years, the administration is trying to raise an average of $1.4 billion from reforming the "treatment of insurance companies and products" -- more than half of that revenue generated from expense disallowances for corporate-owned life insurance.

In fact, life insurers are worried about a number of provisions in the administration's budget, which would still need congressional approval. The new taxes on COLI are opposed by five associations concerned with the life sector, including the Association for Advanced Life Underwriting and the American Council of Life Insurers. This product of the life business protects "against possible job loss from the death of owners or key employees" and it is also "widely used to finance and secure important employee and retiree benefits," they said in a statement...

INN: Insurers Critical of Several Obama Budget Proposals for 2011