First-Party Versus Third-Party Compensation for Automobile Accidents: Evidence From Canada

Insurance regimes for compensating losses arising from automobile accidents vary by jurisdiction, ranging from a pure tort system to a pure no-fault system, with both systems having well-documented benefits and costs. The majority of published research focuses on the benefits and costs associated with the compensation for bodily injury. This article extends the existing literature by examining the differences between first-party and third-party recovery for both physical damage and bodily injury losses in Canada. Our comparison of auto insurance costs per insured vehicle suggests that government-run, pure no-fault provinces have lower average costs than provinces with private tort and modified no-fault. Lower costs arise from the elimination of tort costs associated with noneconomic damages, lower claims settlement costs due to first-party compensation, and scales of economy arising from monopoly power. The second goal of the article is to examine the impact of first- versus third-party compensation on the settlement of property damage claims. We analyze the claim files of a large insurer that operates within both a traditional tort (third-party) environment and a first-party recovery environment for property damage. We find that in a first-party recovery regime claims are settled sooner, settlement costs are lower, and not-at-fault drivers are compensated at a higher rate than in the traditional tort environment.     

农民工职业病保险补偿制度评价与优化研究

工伤保险是当前农民工职业病最主要的保险补偿方式,然而制度设计上偏重普通职业伤害、忽视职业病患者特殊需求的现实,导致大部分农民工职业病患者都无法从工伤保险中得到足额的赔偿金来维持自身及家庭的正常生活。为保障农民工职业病患者的合法权益、缓解因职业病而导致的致贫现象,建议根据当前外出务工农民的现实保险需求,完善这一群体的医疗和养老保险制度,引入商业保险参与农民工职业病患者的保险补偿,构建以工伤保险等社会保险为主体、商业雇主责任保险为补充的多元保险补偿模式。     

The Impact of No-Fault Legislation on Automobile Insurance

Abstract

Since its inception, the effectiveness of no-fault legislation has been highly debated. Although some research suggests that no-fault laws are effective in reducing costs, other evidence suggests that the current no-fault systems may not meet the original objectives. This study provides a detailed assessment of the relation of no-fault laws and automobile insurance losses for the period 1994 to 2007. By examining total automobile insurance losses along with liability and personal injury protection losses, we are able to determine if and how specific provisions of the laws are related to claims costs. We find a negative relation between the presence of a no-fault law and total losses, which suggests that no-fault systems are associated with lower losses than the traditional tort system. In addition, an examination of no-fault-only states suggests that specific provisions of no-fault laws, such as thresholds and limitations on benefits, have some effect on losses. With the sunset of Colorado’s no-fault legislation in 2003, the recent passage of Personal Injury Protection Reform in Florida, and proposed federal choice legislation, the overall impact of no-fault as well as the specific components of the laws are of heightened importance to consumers, insurers, and lawmakers.     

Empowering the managed care consumer: not as easy as it sounds

Managed care remains one of the most highly publicized issues in employee benefits, with its accompanying controversy causing concern to the consumer and the employer. The authors of this article discuss the very basic things consumers of health benefits should know about their plans in order to be prepared, as well as what they should reasonably expect from employers that sponsor the plans.     

Employee responsibility in benefit change

If employers want to move employees beyond superficial acceptance of benefit changes, organizations need to increase the focus on how they manage the change process and support employee decision making. This article describes how employers can help workers understand changes and, through effective change management and communication, successfully navigate in an evolving benefits world. Using recent survey research about large employer and employee attitudes, the authors demonstrate tangible proof that these efforts pay off, both in financial and cultural terms.     

Managing health and welfare plans instead of letting them manage you

The explosive growth and change in the health care provider industry is presenting a considerable challenge to employers that manage these benefits for their employees. Corporate mergers, supportive federal and state legislation expanding benefit availability and access to new consumer markets are a few of the forces changing the shape of the industry. Furthermore, participants are more knowledgeable about their benefit plans and are more vocal about their needs. The authors discuss these challenges and possible solutions for the employer that is attempting to determine how plan delivery and management needs can be served in a way that supports business environment and strategy.     

Pay Without Performance: Overview of the Issues

In their recent book, Pay Without Performance: The Unfulfilled Promise of Executive Compensation , the authors of this article provided a comprehensive critique of U.S. executive pay practices and the corporate governance processes that produce them, and then offered a number of proposals for improving both pay and governance. This article presents an overview of their analysis and proposals.
The authors' analysis suggests that the pay-setting process in U.S. public companies has strayed far from the economist's model of "arm's-length contracting" between executives and boards in a competitive labor market. In place of this conventional model, which is standard in corporate law as well as economics, the authors argue that managerial power and influence play a major role in shaping executive pay, and in ways that end up imposing significant costs on investors and the economy.
The main concern is not the levels of executive pay, but rather the distortion of incentives caused by compensation practices that fail to tie pay to performance and to limit executives' ability to sell their shares. Also troubling are "the correlation between power and pay, the systematic use of compensation practices that obscure the amount and performance insensitivity of pay, and the showering of gratuitous benefits on departing executives."
To address these problems, the authors propose three kinds of changes:

• 1)

  increases in transparency , accomplished in part by new SEC rules requiring annual corporate disclosure that provides "the dollar value of all forms of compensation" (including "stealth compensation" in the form of pensions and other post-retirement benefits) and an analysis of the relationship between the past year's pay and performance, as well as more timely and informative disclosure of insider stock purchases and sales;

       
  
  

论劳务派遣中雇主责任的分配

派遣工与派遣单位、用工单位形成一重劳动关系,派遣单位、用工单位作为共同雇主参与到这一劳动关系中。但《劳动合同法》对劳务派遣劳动关系缺乏清晰界定,以致在雇主责任分配制度中存在诸多缺陷。为保护派遣工权益,应在劳务派遣中构建科学合理的雇主责任分配制度,对雇主责任的主次划分和雇主责任的承担方式等事项作出合理安排。     

Designing and managing employer-sponsored long-term care plans

Due to prevalent demographic factors, long-term care is an issue of increasing concern to American workers. The cost and time involved in ever-expanding long-term care responsibilities for many employees has resulted in increased indirect employer costs. The authors argue that providing' long-term care as part of the employee benefit plan is an efficient and effective way to manage these increasing costs for both the employer and the employee. The article offers discussion of plan design for long-term care, including issues to be considered and strategy for plan management.     

Economic behaviour of the firm and prevention of occupational injuries

In this paper an economic model of the firm's behaviour is presented, examining the interrelationship between prevention activities and employment level. A competitive firm with a fixed capital stock is considered. Two decisions must be made: the level of employment of homogeneous workers (L) and the level of prevention activities (I). Although many simplifying assumptions are adopted, the impact of wage rate and compensation level on both decision variables is sign ambiguous. Moreover the case where injured workers are irreplaceable is more difficult than its counterpart with perfect substitutability.     

The cost of treating injured workers: the changing workers' compensation landscape

To better understand the impact of changing health care delivery on the workers' compensation system and the cost of treating injured workers, the author examines the program within the context of recent environmental changes--including the likely impact of managed care.     

Managing demographic risk

In developed nations, the workforce is aging rapidly. That trend has serious implications. Companies could face severe labor shortages in a few years as workers retire, taking critical knowledge with them. Businesses may also see productivity decline among older employees, especially in physically demanding jobs. The authors, partners at Boston Consulting Group, offer managers a systematic way to assess these dual threats--capacity risk and productivity risk--at their companies. It involves studying the age distribution of their employees to see if large percentages fall within high age brackets and then projecting--by location, unit, and job category--how the distribution will change over the next 15 years. Managers must also factor in both the impact of strategic moves on personnel needs and the future supply of workers in the market. When RWE Power analyzed its trends, the company learned that in 2018 almost 80% of its workers would be over 50. What's more, in certain critical areas its labor surplus was about to become a sizable shortfall. For instance, a shortage of specialized engineers would develop in the company just as their ranks in the job market thinned and competition to hire them intensified. Reversing its downsizing course, RWE Power took steps to increase its supply of workers in those key positions. The authors show how companies that face talent gaps, as RWE Power did, can close them through training, transfers, recruitment, retention, productivity improvements, and outsourcing. They also describe measures that companies can take to keep older workers productive, including workplace accommodations, revised compensation structures, performance incentives, and targeted health care management. The key is to identify and address potential problems early. Firms that do so will gain an edge on rivals that are still relentlessly focused on reducing head count.     

Insurance Company Employees' Financial Expertise and Practices: Implications on Benefit Participation and Satisfaction

Employers continue to shift financial decision-making responsibility for employee benefits to employees. This article examines employees' financial practices, financial expertise, and levels of benefit participation and overall satisfaction. We show that there are significant differences in employees' financial practices and financial expertise based on socio-demographic characteristics. While levels of benefit satisfaction and employer ranking are high, significant differences in how employees feel toward their employer exist. Employees more highly value traditional benefits than nontraditional benefits, but satisfaction with benefits was high regardless of take-up rate. We also find that respondents are more knowledgeable over experiential financial concepts than more specific financial concepts like qualifying conditions for a traditional individual retirement account. Employer-sponsored financial education programs, which increase employee understanding of employer-provided benefits and their importance to employees' financial well-being, should improve overall employee satisfaction, loyalty, and productivity.     

论劳动基准法中用人单位的惩罚性赔偿责任

劳动基准具有公私法交融的社会法品格,其义务主体为用人单位,其权利主体则有国家和劳动者。当用人单位违反劳动基准义务,不仅应承担对国家的公法中的责任,还应承担对劳动者的私法中的责任。为追求实质公平、建立正确的利益导向机制以及构建与劳动基准法相匹配的责任制度,有必要在劳动基准法中引入惩罚性赔偿制度     

Claiming Behavior in Workers' Compensation

Using administrative data on workers' compensation claims in Michigan combined with data collected from a sample of workers identified by physicians as having work‐related pain in their backs, wrists, hands, or shoulders, this article provides evidence that a substantial number of potentially eligible workers do not file workers' compensation claims. Multivariate analysis identifies the effects of various factors on the probability of filing a workers' compensation claim, conditional on having a work‐related health problem. We find that the severity of the worker's condition and the worker's general health are the most important determinants of the decision to file, and that the generosity of wage loss benefits also affects the decision of an eligible worker to file. Finally, claims propensities vary considerably across workplaces, holding all other measured factors constant.     

Mary Parker Follett,managerial responsibility,and the future of capitalism

In this paper we examine the work of Mary Parker Follett as it relates to current management practice. Specifically, we focus on her development of the concepts of integration and participation with respect to the employer–employee relationship in the context of the low-skill workforce. At their core, both of these concepts relate to the idea that management should attend to the concerns of workers. However, recent trends that have had the effect of reducing the attachment of workers to their organizations, particularly changes in the psychological employment contract and the use of contingent and temporary workforces, also reduce the likelihood of genuine integration and participation in organizations. We then connect these changes to the problem of income inequality and suggest that the same organizational practices that have reduced employee attachment may also lead many people to question the legitimacy of capitalism as an economic system through the absence of a societally shared prosperity. We suggest that by reconnecting to Follett's concepts of integration and participation in the employer–employee relationship, better results can be obtained for both organizations and workers, leading to restored faith in capitalism. We close with an agenda for future research based on the implications of Follett's work for present-day organizations and society.     

AN ANALYSIS OF THE AUTO CHOICE REFORM ACT OF 1997

Abstract: The authors examine the nuances involved in no-fault coverage. They focus their examination on the concept of "choice," providing a perspective on both coverage and constitutional questions.     

The Usefulness of the Wind-Up Measure of Pension Liabilities: A Labor Market Perspective

Financial economists have long favored the use of a wind-up measure of the firm's pension liabilities. Yet the pension liabilities of the firm also represent the pension wealth of its workers. It is reasonable to presume that workers and shareholders have a common view of the pension contract. If the wind-up measure depicts the true pension liabilities of the firm, then the wage concession granted by its workers must reflect the fact that the firm may choose to terminate the plan at any time. Data on the wage-service characteristics of the membership of a sample of final earnings plans in Canada suggest, contrary to the implications of the wind-up measure, that workers' wages do not internalize accruing pension benefits on a year-to-year basis. Instead, the data suggest that pension plans may be a vehicle through which a significant portion of the total compensation of individual employees is deferred until their later work years, and that the wind-up measure may well understate the pension liabilities of an on-going firm.     

COBRA notice--bankruptcy--stay. Buchanan v. Golden Casting Corporation Hourly Health Benefit Plan

In an absence of special circumstances, the automatic stay that protects an employer from suit while its bankruptcy is pending does not apply to an action brought against its employee welfare benefit plan under ERISA because the plan, not the employer, is the proper entity to sue for benefits. Similarly, the employer's automatic stay does not apply to the individual fiduciary sued for breach of fiduciary duty in administering the plan. The bankrupt employer has no property interest in either the plan assets or the assets of the individual fiduciary and, therefore, the stay does not protect them from suit.     

Employer interference with ERISA rights and benefits. DiFederico v. Rolm Company

DiFederico v. Rolm Company, 201 F.3d 200 (3rd Cir. 2000): A former employee who contended she was terminated because her employer wanted to avoid the cost associated with long-term disability obligations had to prove that her employer had a specific intent to violate Section 510 of ERISA. Section 510 prohibits an employer from interfering with her attainment of rights or benefits associated with an employee benefit plan. Proving specific intent requires proof that the employer made a conscious decision to interfere, and when there is no direct evidence of that intent, courts apply a shifting burden analysis like the one used in employment discrimination cases. After the former employee makes an initial circumstantial showing that she was terminated for a reason that violated Section 510 and the employer articulates a legitimate reason for its action, the former employee must prove that the employer's reason was pretextual.