Search

Byline: JERRY GEISEL According to their election platforms, the Democrats and Republicans agree that they would like to change the system established by the Affordable Care Act, but neither party [...]

Byline: Jerry Geisel JULIO A. PORTALATIN MERCER L.L.C Federal lawmakers over the past few years have repeatedly raised premiums employers with pension plans pay the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. Julio [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL Employer advocates are cheering House passage of legislation that would restore employees' ability to tap their flexible spending accounts, health savings accounts and health reimbursement arrangements to [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL Proposed IRS regulations that could penalize employers offering financial incentives to certain employees to opt out of company-provided health insurance plans also would shield employers from a [...]

Byline: Jerry Geisel For the second time, a federal appeals court has upheld a 2011 Michigan law that imposes a 1 percent state tax on paid health care claims for [...]

Byline: Jerry Geisel While LafargeHolcim U.S.' move to high-deductible health plans last year shifted substantial costs to U.S. plan participants, the building materials manufacturer also took steps to ease that [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL BENEFIT MANAGER OF THE YEAR Philia Swam LAFARGEHOLCIM U.S. For Philia Swam, improving employees' health and wellness has been the passion driving her career. For much of [...]

Byline: Jerry Geisel When LafargeHolcim U.S. moved to consumer-driven, high-deductible health plans last year for its employees, it spent $2 million of the cost savings on added benefits. The company [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL One of the biggest benefits trends in recent years has been employers dropping retiree health coverage and moving retirees to private exchanges. Last year, LafargeHolcim U.S. joined [...]

Byline: Jerry Geisel Giving employees powerful financial incentives -- substantial employer contributions to employees' health savings accounts -- to take better care of themselves is just one way LafargeHolcim Ltd. [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL If there is one change Philia Swam would like federal lawmakers to make in the 2010 health care reform law, it would be repealing the Affordable Care [...]

Byline: Jerry Geisel What if an employee wants to lose weight, stop smoking or eat healthier? At LafargeHolcim U.S., U.S. employees have access to a program to help them achieve [...]

Byline: Jerry Geisel Philia Swam responds quickly when asked why she has spent most of her professional career working for one company -- building materials manufacturer Lafarge North America Inc., [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL The U.S. Treasury Department's rejection of a proposal by the Central States Pension Fund to slash benefits sets the stage for the collapse of the massively underfunded [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL A proposal by Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton to lower the Medicare eligibility age could be a mixed bag for employers. Under the 1965 federal law that [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL A federal rule that puts retirement plan advisers at risk of civil penalties if they fail to consider customers' best interests also could put employers at risk [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL Legislation that would end a widely reviled budget-balancing 'gimmick' of increasing the premiums employers must pay to the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. faces a difficult but not [...]

Byline: Jerry Geisel LAURIE SOLOMON THE COCA-COLA CO. Laurie Solomon, director of global risk management at The Coca-Cola Co. in Atlanta, will retire this week after 20 years with the [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL Legislation introduced in the House of Representatives that would effectively give many employer health plans more time before they trigger the health care reform law's excise tax [...]

Byline: Jerry Geisel For many years, employer sponsorship of defined benefit pension plans has been declining. The past ten years in particular has seen a rapid fall in the number [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL The IRS has given colleges and universities more time to scrap long-established health insurance plans offered to student teaching assistants and devise new approaches, but the plans' [...]

Byline: Jerry Geisel When it comes to getting the facts straight on health care issues, presidential candidates need to brush up. Take Republican frontrunner Donald Trump. In his health care [...]

Byline: Jerry Geisel The United States and Canada share a several thousand-mile border, and the differences in the two countries' health care systems are just as vast. In Canada, health [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL State lawmakers continue their drive to amend their states' captive insurance company laws, with roughly a dozen states either amending or considering changes in the past year. [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL Two months after Innovative Physician Solutions Risk Retention Group moved to Vermont from Arizona, Chief Operating Officer Mark Tabler said he and the RRG's board of directors [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL Once exclusively used to fund property/casualty risks, captive insurers increasingly are being tapped by their parents to fund corporate employee benefit risks. A key advantage is cost [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL Enrollment in public health insurance exchanges this year will fall far short of earlier government predictions largely because employers are retaining their group health plans at a [...]

Employers in 1998 can count on rate increases from health maintenance organizations. HMOs say they need to make up for low rates offered in their drive for market share and [...]

Traditional indemnity plans' stronghold on the retiree health care market is crumbling as more employers and retirees discover the cost-saving advantages of Medicare risk health maintenance organizations. During the past [...]

Maternity stays, gag clauses among top targets for reform The continuing growth of managed care - and some of the problems it causes for enrollees and providers - is the [...]

Many companies are beginning to realize the cost-savings to be gained in outsourcing their entire health benefit administration operations to third parties. Aside from reducing administration costs, outsourcing promises to significantly improve the delivery of health services. Companies which have realized the potentials of outsourcing benefits management include Pacific Telesis which turned over benefits administration to Prudential Insurance Co. of America and BankAmerica Corp. which hired Kwasha Lipton L.L.C.

Vermont senators, governor go to bat for captive owners WASHINGTON - The captive insurance industry is getting some high-powered help in its battle to convince the Clinton administration to drop [...]

A survey of 2,395 employers by the employee benefits consulting firm A. Foster Higgins & Co reveals that the medical inflation rate for group health coverage plans was only 8% in 1993. Group health care costs for individual employees rose but 8% from $3,502 in 1992 to $3,781 in 1993. The 8% increase came after five consecutive years in which the medical inflation rate for group health care plans exceeded 10%.

Byline: JERRY GEISEL When Congress gave final approval this month to legislation repealing key provisions of the health care reform law, it was the first time lawmakers had done so [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL Congressional support to repeal the widely criticized Cadillac tax on costly health plans is growing, but the outcome of that drive is far from certain. Both the [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL The last major congressional action of 2015 --passage of a massive tax and government spending measure -- could delay government regulators issuing the last major rule under [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL AND SHELBY LIVINGSTON The U.S. Supreme Court, which already has resolved three major controversies involving the health care reform law, will take up another one in 2016: [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL Developments related to the nation's health care reform law dominated benefits management news once again in 2015, with the most important Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act [...]

Byline: Jerry Geisel Lori Seidenberg DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS Alden Torch Financial L.L.C., Denver Age: 44 Lori Seidenberg got her start in the insurance field more than a quarter of century [...]

Byline: Jerry Geisel Rachael Ingle MANAGING DIRECTOR Aon Hewitt, Dublin Age: 49 For Rachael Ingle, one of the most satisfying parts of her job is helping clients resolve retirement plan [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL The U.S. Senate's approval last week of budget legislation may set the stage for repeal of the health care reform law's fiercely opposed 'Cadillac tax.' The Senate, [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL Deborah Forbes was stunned when she learned that a budget deal congressional leaders and the Obama administration hammered out included provisions that again boost insurance premiums employers [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL The Central States Teamsters pension plan, the first to tap a relatively new federal law that allows financially troubled multiemployer plans to cut participants' benefits, is breaking [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL Often overshadowed by their far better-known cousins -- 401(k) plans -- 403(b) plans are playing an increasingly important role in providing retirement benefits to millions of employees. [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL Repealing the health care reform law's automatic enrollment requirement will help employers, but that move does not open the door to repeal of other law provisions employers [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL As mergers and consolidations continue to shrink the number of health insurers, other health providers are entering or expanding their market presence in insurance, giving employers a [...]

Byline: Jerry Geisel MATT HERRMANN TOWERS WATSON & CO. Hardly a week goes by without a corporation announcing that it is de-risking its pension plan, either by shifting the liability [...]

Byline: JERRY GEISEL Fueled by employer and labor union lobbying, Congressional support to repeal the health care reform law's highly unpopular 40% excise tax has grown rapidly in recent weeks, [...]

Byline: Jerry Geisel LINDSEY MAGUIRE 34 Account executive and vice president of employee benefits IMA Financial Group Inc. Being a benefits broker, Lindsey Maguire said, is far more than finding [...]

Byline: Jerry Geisel POLLY THOMAS 38 Benefits consultant and national director of clinical consulting services CBIZ Benefits & Insurance Services Inc. Polly Thomas doesn't hesitate when asked what she enjoys [...]