Search

The Illusory Coverage Doctrine, if it ever becomes a true legal doctrine, has the potential to be an incredibly useful tool in insurance law. But courts around the country take very different approaches to the doctrine, ranging from one end of the spectrum--a hard-nosed "pro-insurer" stance where coverage is not illusory so long as a policy provides any coverage--to the other--a muscular "pro-policyholder" public policy approach that requires coverage even if some other exclusion might have prevented coverage under the applicable policy. And along the spectrum are various other iterations, contributing to the complete lack of certainty or consistency about the Illusory Coverage Doctrine or its application in insurance law. In 2019, the American Law Institute published the Restatement of the Law of Liability Insurance to bring consistency and certainty to the field of liability insurance law. But the Restatement makes no mention of the Illusory Coverage Doctrine. This article explores the inconsistent and often problematic applications of the doctrine. It also proposes that the Restatement be revised to address the Illusory Coverage Doctrine in a way that benefits both policyholders and insurers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aims to investigate how directors' and officers' (D&O) liability insurance, legal responsibilities, and firm political connections collectively influence corporate litigation risk. D&O insurance is common, but its effectiveness in limiting litigation risk in diverse legal and political circumstances is questionable. The study employs a quantitative research approach, utilizing regression analysis and moderation techniques. Data are collected from a diverse sample of 411 individuals comprising directors, legal experts, government regulators, public company staff, and insurance providers. Regression models explore the relationships between D&O insurance, legal responsibilities, political connections, and corporate litigation risk. The findings provide practical insights for stakeholders in corporate governance, informing strategies to enhance risk management and compliance frameworks. This study contributes to the existing literature by empirically examining the comprehensive influence of D&O insurance, legal responsibilities, and political connections on corporate litigation risk. It integrates multiple variables and moderating effects to offer a nuanced understanding of corporate governance dynamics. Strategic adoption of D&O insurance can effectively mitigate litigation risks associated with legal responsibilities, although caution is warranted regarding the exacerbating effects of firm political connections. By understanding these dynamics, firms can proactively enhance their governance practices and adapt to regulatory changes, thereby improving overall corporate resilience and sustainability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is a summary of the requirements that a social worker with a Masters' in Social Work must meet to become independently licensed in a given state or jurisdiction in the United States. These requirements and the titles that are used by a given state for a fully licensed clinical social worker vary by state. A review of the experience hours that are required under approved supervision; the direct supervision hours that are required by an approved supervisor; the number of direct contact hours that are required by some states; and the examination that must be passed to become an independent clinical social worker will be discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Public health, as one of the constituent elements of national security, is primarily determined by the protection of the population from the spread of epidemics on the territory of a certain state. It seems that its state can also be evidenced by the extent to which the population is protected from illegal and unscrupulous actions or inaction of medical workers. The latter, while performing their professional duties to provide medical care, may provide substandard medical services or even harm a patient's health or take his or her life, which may entail their civil and/or criminal liability. Even if a medical worker is held criminally liable, he or the medical institution of which he is an employee is still obliged to compensate material damage to the patient for the harm to his health. Analysis of judicial practice both in civil and criminal cases shows that today it is unlikely to obtain such compensation from a medical worker even in court. In order to change this situation, it is necessary to legislate the institute of professional liability of medical workers. In June 2024 in the first reading the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine adopted as a basis the Draft Law of Ukraine on self-government in the field of health care dated 25.12.2023 (reg. No. 10372), which provides for the establishment of the institute of civil liability insurance for representatives of medical and pharmaceutical professions. That is why today the search for the optimal legal model of such an institute is of great importance. In this case, the legislation of individual EU countries (the Republic of Lithuania, the Republic of Latvia and the Federal Republic of Germany) regulating the institute of professional liability insurance for medical professionals can be taken as a basis. Therefore, in this article on the basis of comparison of individual provisions of these laws will be realized the identification of all the disadvantages and advantages of this institute. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the innovative approaches to resolving medical disputes in China through alternative dispute resolution mechanisms, such as mediation and one-stop services. It highlights the importance of preventing medical disputes and improving conflict resolution processes. The document also includes a bibliometric analysis to evaluate the current state of research on medical disputes. The Chinese government has implemented various strategies to address medical disputes, emphasizing the need for collaborative efforts to prevent and resolve conflicts effectively. [Extracted from the article]

The role of information asymmetry in automobile insurance markets has been studied extensively. However, not all empirical studies found correlation between driver risk and chosen coverage. There are two explanations for this (Cohen and Siegelman 2010): (1) information asymmetry may not characterise environments in which consumers cannot act on private information; (2) most studies measure not risky driver behaviour, but ex post realisations of such behaviour, e.g. claims. In Taiwan's taxi insurance market, insurers cannot freely use rating factors. Usage density (e.g. daily distance), a direct measure of risk, therefore constitutes private information. Using ordinary least squares models, we find that usage density is positively correlated with total premiums. Using logistic models, we find high-density drivers more likely to buy additional policies. Thus, usage density is positively correlated with insurance demand, consistent with the risk-coverage hypothesis. Unlimited-mileage coverage may disproportionately attract high-risk drivers, an argument in favour of usage-based insurance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper begins by establishing a three-party game model involving three key players: the insurer, the firm, and the government. This model is used to analyze the utility of each party in various scenarios, one of which encourages green innovation within the firm. According to this model, when the insurer rejects insurance coverage and the government maintains a neutral stance on environmental liability insurance, the firm may opt to engage in green innovation. Green innovation fundamentally serves as a mechanism to mitigate environmental pollution risks stemming from the firm's operational processes. In cases where the insurer declines underwriting, it becomes rational for the firm to enhance its risk management through green innovation, which can be viewed as a mitigating factor in the context of environmental liability insurance. To comprehensively examine the overall impact of environmental liability insurance on the green innovation endeavors of firms, we use a mediation effect model utilizing firm-level data from heavily polluting industries. This paper delves into the intricate relationship between environmental liability insurance and the capacity of heavily polluting firms to engage in green innovation, along with the mediating influence of financing constraints between these two factors. The findings of this analysis suggest that the acquisition of environmental liability insurance enhances the green innovation capabilities of firms operating in heavily polluting industries by alleviating financing constraints, serving as a mediating factor in this regard. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the concept of social inflation as it affects medical malpractice insurance claims, a phenomenon that warrants monitoring by risk managers in health care. The authors define social inflation as the growth in the cost of insurance claims that exceeds general inflation. The authors use data aggregated from insurance company Annual Statements and from a national database of malpractice reports to estimate that social inflation added $2.4 billion to $3.5 billion to booked losses over the 10 years ending in 2021, which is between 8% and 11% of total losses. The authors' approach is to show growth in loss development factors, a metric that property/casualty actuaries use to estimate claim costs. This approach is explained in detail. The paper concludes with commentary on how risk managers can incorporate consideration of social inflation in their overall assessment of risk. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Sakarya University Journal of Law Faculty (SHD) is the property of Sakarya University Journal of Law Faculty (SHD) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Developed economies like USA, UK etc. have utilised insurance as a supplementary tool for creating a protected society by strengthening the existing social security net through affordable health insurance programmes, pension and annuity insurance plans, liability insurance etc. In comparison, insurance in India is still seen as an investment tool, rather than as a risk mitigation mechanism. Though Government has taken measures to replicate the model followed in West through social security schemes like Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Bima Yojana (PMJJBY), Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Bima Yojana (PMSBY), Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogaya Yojana (PMJAY) etc., but still a large section of the society perceives insurance as a means to get tax benefits, instead of a buffer to protect against financial losses in case of an unfortunate event. Protection Gap which is a measure of the uninsured losses of a country, is significantly higher for India when compared to other developed or developing nations. The mortality protection gap in life insurance, which dominates the Indian insurance industry, is at staggering 87% as per a survey done by National Insurance Academy. Despite health insurance being the top contributor under non-life segment in India, the health protection gap stands at 73%. The estimated pension protection gap is even higher at 93%. Thus, it becomes imperative for the Indian insurance industry to bridge these gaps through high decibel awareness campaigns, so that citizens can leverage insurance as a tool for financial protection (and not as substitute for return-oriented investments) and reap its real benefits. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The calculation of life and health insurance liabilities is based on assumptions about mortality and disability rates, and insurance companies face systematic insurance risks if assumptions about these rates change. In this paper, we study how to manage systematic insurance risks in a multi-state setup by considering securities linked to the transition intensities of the model. We assume there exists a market for trading two securities linked to, for instance, mortality and disability rates, the de-risking option and the de-risking swap, and we describe the optimization problem to find the de-risking strategy that minimizes systematic insurance risks in a multi-state setup. We develop a numerical example based on the disability model, and the results imply that systematic insurance risks significantly decrease when implementing de-risking strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Theoretical theories underpin the governance effect of directors' and officers' (D&O) liability insurance include agency costs and stakeholder interests. Motivated by mixed evidence on the corporate governance effects of D&O, we ask whether and how the directors' and officers' (D&O) liability insurance affects corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance in China, one of the largest and fastest growing economies in the world. We develop two contrasting hypotheses: (1) supervision and incentives versus (2) opportunism. To test these hypotheses, we rely on Chinese A‐share market data and fixed effect panel regressions, along with a battery of robustness checks, including Heckman sample selection bias, two‐stage least square instrumental variable (2SLS‐IV), difference‐in‐difference (DiD), propensity score matching (PSM) analyses. Consistent with supervision and incentives hypotheses and stakeholder theory, we find that D&O liability insurance significantly increases firm's CSR performance and firms renewing D&O liability insurance with the same insurers tend to have better CSR performance. Two possible mechanisms supporting this positive relation between D&O liability insurance and CSR performance are information transparency and accounting conservatism. Aside from theoretical contributions, our findings offer important practical contributions such as promoting D&O as external governance and ensuring the functions of D&O insurance comprehensively and correctly understood. Integrating D&O insurance with CSR can be viewed as an important business strategy by mitigating risks, enhancing reputation, ensuring legal compliance, and supporting responsible decision‐making. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Strategic Universe Journal / Univers Strategic is the property of Dimitrie Cantemir Christian University, Institute for Security Studies and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Human Sciences Journal / Revue des Sciences Humaines is the property of Universite des Freres Mentouri Constantine and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This true story of a mediation in a personal injury lawsuit describes a sequence of events and fairly common practices that raise significant questions about mediation ethics as well as attorney ethics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Insurance companies need to estimate accurately the possible future claims payments and thus allocate sufficient reserves to avoid financial difficulties. Reserve estimates are usually based on historical data from various sources of information. In classical reserve estimation methods, the reserve estimate is based on either paid claims information only or incurred claims information. Since all claims are eventually settled, in theory, the ultimate claim estimates obtained using paid or incurred claims data are expected to become equal. In practice, however, the ultimate estimates obtained using these two sources of information generally differ. Therefore, methods have been developed that use both sources of information to obtain the same or similar estimates. Munich Chain Ladder, Extended Complementary Loss Ratio and Paid-Incurred Chain methods are among the widely used ones. In the Turkish insurance sector, reserves are estimated using the Chain Ladder method and the Munich method. This study aims to investigate the alternative method for estimating reserves for Turkish Highways Motor Vehicles Compulsory Liability Insurance. Reserves are estimated using all these methods. Based on mean squared error, it is concluded that the Paid Incurred Chain method can be an alternative. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes a new boosting machine based on forward stagewise additive modeling with cost-complexity pruned trees. In the Tweedie case, it deals directly with observed responses, not gradients of the loss function. Trees included in the score progressively reduce to the root-node one, in an adaptive way. The proposed Adaptive Boosting Tree (ABT) machine thus automatically stops at that time, avoiding to resort to the time-consuming cross validation approach. Case studies performed on motor third-party liability insurance claim data demonstrate the performances of the proposed ABT machine for ratemaking, in comparison with regular gradient boosting trees. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To improve the problem of environmental pollution liability insurance, this paper constructs an evolutionary game model based on the government, insurance companies, and polluting enterprises. The findings indicate that in an imperfect market, penalty and subsidy mechanisms boost insurance rates. Reinsurance facilitates insurer underwriting, prompting gradual government withdrawal. Effective pricing mechanisms by insurance companies enhance environmental liability insurance operations amid evolving market mechanisms, offering theoretical guidance for addressing challenges in implementing such insurance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Alternative Disputes Resolution (ADR) systems are becoming increasingly important tools in recent years for the management and resolution of health responsibility cases, but their dissemination and efficiency are still poorly described. The purpose of this paper is to present an ADR system in the autonomous province of Bolzano: the Conciliation Commission. Methods: systematic collection of all claims of the South Tyrol Sanitary Service that were dealt with in the Conciliation Commission from 1 January 2012 to 31 December 2022. Results: closing times of the applications received turn out to be less than a year in 63.8% of the cases, with a number of cases managed rather stably in the time, even if minimal if compared to the number of complaints received to the South Tirol Health Service. Only 5.3% of the application continued the legal process before a civil court. Conclusions: the Conciliation Commission of South Tirol appears to be an excellent instrument for the resolution of disputes in the healthcare field, with rapid resolution times and little to zero costs for the healthcare company, a public health institution. Despite its effectiveness, it seems to be a tool that is still little-known in South Tyrol. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

I argue that the idea of pursuing a strong personalization of the motor liability insurance conflicts hopelessly with the need to refer to homogeneous groups of policyholders large enough to be correctly priced. I furthermore discuss the fact that, due to purely algebraic reasons, it is a priori impossible to obtain the right individual premium by the usual method of multiplying a common base one by a series of factors (as many, as the personalization variables one has chosen to consider). Finally, I point out that the choice of the said factors, not always made with sufficient respect for the statistical evidences, not only gives rise to serious problems concerning the system's fairness and transparency, but puts theoretically at risk the Companies management balance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The glaring gap in tort theory is its failure to take adequate account of liability insurance. Much of tort theory fails to recognize the active and central role that liability insurance plays in tort law and litigation, or mentions liability insurance only briefly. Liability insurance is treated as exogenous to tort law itself--as if it were merely a contingent source of outside financing, like a bank that passively guarantees a loan. It is no exaggeration to say that liability insurance played a defining and (in our view) salutary role in creating modern tort liability. Modern tort liability would not look at all as it does today if liability insurance had not existed and influenced tort law's development in the ways that it did. This Article calls upon tort scholars of all theoretical and methodological stripes to address the significance of liability insurance by incorporating consideration of liability insurance into their work. We first lay the groundwork for understanding liability insurance's significance by describing the role that liability insurance plays in the life cycle of a tort claim, sketching the contemporary incidence of liability insurance and commercial self-insurance. We then provide a novel contribution to the tort law literature by identifying a collection of important judicial opinions that have made express reference to the availability (or unavailability) of liability insurance in precedentsetting, liability-expanding, and liability-limiting tort cases. We further identify the ways that liability insurance historically has influenced, and continues to influence, the shape and scope of tort law. We specifically identify a number of significant tort law doctrines and practices, such as the thin-skull rule, that we argue would never have persisted in the absence of liability insurance. Given this evidence, we argue that it is liability insurers who--paradoxically--have fueled the continuing expansion of American tort liability that began more than a century ago. We then examine modern tort theory, much of which fails to take adequate account of liability insurance. We explain how to begin filling the gap in tort theory that results from omitting consideration of or inadequately considering liability insurance, showing how liability insurance can appropriately figure in both deontic and consequentialist theories of tort liability. Only by greater recognition and candid acknowledgment of the role that liability insurance plays in tort cases can tort theory provide an accurate picture of the field that it seeks to describe. Finally, we offer lessons for the courts, calling not only for more open acknowledgment of the significance of liability insurance in judicial opinions but also for a radical change in trial practice by proposing that judges explicitly consider record evidence (including the availability of liability insurance) on the insurability of the risk at issue in tort cases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Medical professionals face high stress due to the type of work they do and the prolonged working hours. Frequent burnout results due to the challenging nature of their work. Added to the stress of work, malpractice lawsuits add to their burden. In India, most doctors work in compromised settings with poor infrastructure and manpower but are expected to follow the best practices. In court, they are judged with the Bolam and Bolitho tests being essential considerations. Several tragic incidents have been reported, including depression, anger issues, and even suicide deaths of healthcare professionals (HCPs) after accusations of negligence and subsequent inquiry. Such incidents demonstrate the multitude of challenges an HCP faces in day-to-day practice. It is crucial to find ways to tackle these problems and enhance the capacity of HCP to handle such demanding circumstances. Malpractice litigation can significantly impact the mental health of HCPs. It is common to experience emotional turmoil when faced with a lawsuit. Second victim syndrome (SVS) is a term used to describe a set of symptoms experienced by HCPs who make an error leading to injury to a patient. However, it also happens if he is traumatized by the consequences of violence during healthcare services or a lawsuit or defamation article in newspaper/social media. Following a litigation crisis in their career, many HCPs go through various stages of grief, including shock, denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. At times, death by suicide of the HCPs is well known. SVS is known to profoundly affect the personal, family, economic, professional (defensive practice), and social life of HCPs. HCPs should accept the allegations of negligence as an occupational hazard and prepare for the eventual litigation at least once in a lifetime by knowing about the medical laws, HCP's rights, becoming aware of the emotional turmoil of the lawsuit, preparing to cope with the lawsuit, and seeking help from colleagues and indemnity insurance. Frequent training of the HCPs is strongly recommended to know about the changing laws and also to undergo periodic professional competence enhancement to reduce the incidents of errors amounting to medical negligence. Medical and hospital administration should debrief after any incident and conduct internal investigations to identify systemic flaws and prevent future recurrence, resolve issues within their control at their level, and manage media (mainstream and social media) appropriately. If established, a reporting system with online and offline services will ease the internal administrative investigation process and take appropriate, timely actions. During the crisis, HCPs should have adequate and appropriate insurance or indemnity coverage and mental health support systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Türkiye Adalet Akademisi Dergisi is the property of Justice Academy of Turkey and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Objective: This article examines he potential and resources available within the pension framework, highlighting the key financial mechanisms supporting individuals during times of job cessation or facing significant life risks. Methods: The study employs a social-dynamic approach, analyzing the components and financial strategies of the pension system through extensive forecasting and systemic analysis. Results: The study advocates for the adoption of a social-dynamic approach to evaluate and enhance the financial capabilities integral to the pension infrastructure. The concept and categorization of the resources and services within the pension scheme are introduced by the author. The analysis reveals that discrepancies and inconsistencies in understanding the pension framework's composition and fiscal strategies lead to operational flaws, conflicts, and instability. Conclusion: The study concludes that a revised pension framework must be adopted, emphasizing a hybrid model that incorporates both contributory and capital-funded schemes. This model should enhance the resilience of the pension system, ensuring its capability to meet the demands of current and future retirees and stabilize the financial foundation of the pension provision. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of the article is to present and analyze the method of compensation for a special type of medical damage – neurological perinatal damage – which arises in connection with childbirth and is neuropathological in nature. This damage is irreversible and the cost of medical care, which sometimes continues throughout the child’s entire life, is very high. Claims involving this type of damage generate the highest compensation amounts, which means, from the liability insurance point of view, that it is a “hard-to-insure” injury. This is true for both the Polish and US liability systems, even though they are legal orders apart. What we are dealing here is, on the one hand, the need to support the family of the injured child, so that, thanks to the money obtained, they can begin their treatment and rehabilitation as soon as possible, and on the other hand, the need to take into account the interests of gynecologists and obstetricians, so that their occupations do not become deficit occupations. The idea is to increase the sense of legal security for these socially important medical professions. Given the above, attempts to seek an alternative to the judicial model of liability as a means of compensating this type of medical damage should come as no surprise. An example of an alternative liability model is the legislation enacted in two US states: Virginia and Florida (so-called “slice” no-fault liability models). These models, in effect for more than 35 years, are described in the first part of the article. In the second part, the author compares them with the main principles of the Polish judicial model of liability and the extrajudicial model, which, due to recent amendments to the law have undergone a major transformation. Then (due to the comprehensiveness of the subject matter), using the example of selected representative court cases, the author analyses the types of compensation claims and the amounts of benefits awarded in cases of perinatal neurological damage. The discussion ends with conclusions comparing the US and Polish models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The emergence of high-priced potential cures has sparked significant health policy discussions in South Korea, where the healthcare system is funded through a single-payer National Health Insurance model. We conducted focus group interviews (FGIs) and accompanying surveys with diverse stakeholders to comprehensively understand related issues and find better solutions to the challenges brought by these technologies. Methods: From October to November 2022, 11 FGIs were conducted with stakeholders from various sectors, including government payers, policy and clinical experts, civic and patient organisations, and the pharmaceutical industry, involving a total of 25 participants. These qualitative discussions were supplemented by online surveys to effectively capture and synthesise stakeholder perspectives. Results: Affordability was identified as a critical concern by 84% of stakeholders, followed by clinical uncertainty (76%) and limited value for money (72%). Stakeholders expressed a preference for both financial-based controls and outcome-based pricing strategies to mitigate these challenges. Despite the support for outcome-based refunds, payers raised concerns about the feasibility of instalment payment models, whether linked to outcomes or not, due to the specific challenges of the Korean reimbursement system and the potential risk of 'cumulative liabilities' from ongoing payments for previously administered treatments. In addition, the FGIs highlighted the need for clear budgetary limits for drugs with high uncertainties, with mixed opinions on the creation of special silo funds (64.0% agreement). Less than half (48%) endorsed the use of external reference pricing, currently applied to such essential drugs in South Korea. A significant majority (84%), predominantly non-pharma stakeholders, advocated for addressing cost-effectiveness uncertainty through re-assessment once long-term clinical data become available. Conclusions: This study uncovers a broad agreement among stakeholders on the need for more effective value assessment methodologies for high-priced potential cures, stressing the importance of more robust and comprehensive re-assessment supported by long-term data collection, rather than primarily relying on external reference pricing. Each type of stakeholders exhibited a cautious approach to their specific uncertainties, suggesting that new funding strategies should accommodate these uncertainties with predefined guidelines and agreements prior to the initiation of managed entry agreements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A "seat belt defense" allows a defendant in a third‐party auto liability event to present evidence of seat belt nonuse to reduce a plaintiff's recovery. When successfully applied, the defense has a direct effect on reducing liability payouts by insurers for accidents. Our analysis reveals that seat belt defense laws are associated with a 10% reduction in auto claims costs, which equates to a reduction in loss costs of approximately $14 per insured vehicle. We find little evidence that the defense reduces accident frequency and no evidence that the defense affects seat belt usage. The lack of a deterrent effect on driving behavior suggests that the availability of the defense is not salient to drivers. The reduction in loss costs supports the notion that defense lawyers are aware of the defense and make use of it. The resulting effect of lowering insurance payouts may alleviate increasing auto insurance costs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Central Asian Economic Review is the property of Narxoz University and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The paper examines the valuation and hedging of life insurance obligations in the presence of mortality risk using the local risk-minimizing hedging approach. Roughly speaking, it is assumed that the lifetime of policyholders in an insurance portfolio is modeled by a point process whose stochastic intensity is controlled by a diffusion process. The stock price process is assumed to be a regime-switching Lévy process with non-zero regime-switching drift, where the parameters are assumed to depend on the economic states. Using the Föllmer–Schweizer decomposition, the main valuation and hedging results for a conditional payment process are determined. Some specific situations have been considered in which the local risk-minimizing strategies for a stream of liability payments or a unit-linked contract are presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Effective last-mile (LM) delivery is critical to the efficient functioning of supply chains. In addition to speed and the cost of delivery, environmental and social sustainability are increasingly important factors in last-mile logistics (LML), especially in urban areas. Sustainable solutions such as drones attract special attention from researchers due to their high potential. The future of drone logistics is uncertain due to many barriers. This study analyzes, evaluates and ranks barriers to identify those that most significantly hinder broader drone adoption in LML, and proposes and ranks strategies to overcome them. This type of issue requires the involvement of multiple stakeholders with conflicting goals and interests. Therefore, the study employs a novel hybrid multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) model that combines fuzzy Delphi-based fuzzy factor relationship (Fuzzy D-FARE) and fuzzy comprehensive distance-based ranking (Fuzzy COBRA) methods. The results indicate that the main obstacle to drone implementation in LM is the lack of aviation regulations. The risks of unauthorized access, data misuse, privacy breaches, and data security represent significant challenges. They are followed by ambiguously defined or burdensome requirements for insurance and liability for drone owners. The main contributions of this study are the establishment of a novel hybrid model, identification and ranking of barriers for broader application of drones in LML, and strategies for overcoming them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Zeitschrift für Konfliktmanagement is the property of De Gruyter and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Internationales Handelsrecht is the property of De Gruyter and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)