Talk:McCarran–Ferguson Act

protects the practices of insurance companies from being investigated by public bodies

What most people do not realize is that this act also protects the practices of insurance companies from being investigated by public bodies.

Not true. McCarran-Ferguson protects the traditional role of the states in regulating insurance. It doesn't protect insurance companies from anything except inadvertent federal regulation of insurance. Xrlq (talk) 18:40, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

gao analysis/context

external ref to be formated http://www.gao.gov/decisions/other/304474.pdf Legal Principles Defining the Scope of the Federal Antitrust Exemption for Insurance http://opencrs.com/document/RL31982 RL31982 Insurance Regulation: History, Background, and Recent Congressional Oversight February 11, 2005 Mulp (talk) 07:16, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

new developments

Should there be a new section on this page discussing the new legislation pending in Congress that would repeal McCarran-Ferguson? The House bill passed the Judiciary Committee on Oct. 21. Rpogge (talk) 19:20, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Because the bill will likely change numerous times before becoming law (if it does eventually become law), I'm not sure it's necessary at this point. Also, does anyone know if this is (or if it relates to) the law that prevents insurance companies from selling insurance across state lines?—DMCer™ 07:01, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

There is no federal law prohibiting the sale of insurance across state lines. The problem is with state law: no state permits the sale of an insurance product that has been approved by regulators in another state but not in their own. It would take a federal law to override this and require State A to allow the sale of a policy that has only been approved in State B. McCarran-Ferguson would not impact this, as the federal law would clearly reference insurance, and McCarran-Ferguson only limits the scope of federal statutes that do not. Xrlq (talk) 18:47, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

This act was amended in 2021 with the Competitive Health Insurance Reform Act of 2020, declaring that the McCarran-Ferguson Act does not override antitrust law for health insurance. This should probably replace the mention about the 2010 proposal since it was enacted, whereas the 2010 repeal was not. WunderbarSnek (talk) 20:09, 18 January 2023 (UTC)

References

Orphaned article

I cant believe this article was orphaned until I added a link today, see Talk:Health_care_reform_in_the_United_States#McCarran.E2.80.93Ferguson_Act Ikip (talk) 07:44, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

History of this bill

Trying to piece together the history of the bill:

"The courts ruling came down on June 4, 1944. Senator Pat McCarran of Nevada and Senator Homer Ferguson, Republican of Michigan was the co-authors. The new law passed on March 9, 1945 and was signed by an ailing President Roosevelt."

• http://www.abanet.org/antitrust/at-committees/at-ifs/pdf/05-17-06/katz-bill-05-17-06.pdf ABA powerpoint.
• "Gerald Ford's Justice Department and Ronald Reagan's Federal Trade Commission each called for McCarran-Ferguson's repeal." http://www.slate.com/id/2232443/
• http://www.thefreelibrary.com/MARKING+MILESTONES.%28insurance+products+and+trends+in+the+20th...-a060043890

Ikip (talk) 08:09, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

If you're looking for legislative history, you need to find a really big law library (e.g. one of the huge public university law school libraries) that would carry Congressional materials back to the 1940s. Those libraries tend to have committee reports or hearing transcripts which can shed light on what Congress was thinking when it passed a bill.

I also recommend searching on Google Books and following the link to Stempel on Insurance Contracts, which has a great section explaining how McCarran-Ferguson works. --Coolcaesar (talk) 08:50, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Here's a direct link to that page on Google Books. --Coolcaesar (talk) 08:58, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank you so much for your wonderful suggestions.

Tangent only loosely related to this discussion

I have done a lot of source research in the past for wikipedia articles on several historical periods, the Business Plot to overthrow FDR, theLodge Committee for the Philippine American War regarding American torture and war crimes, the Torture Manuals, Team B, Plan Colombia the World Court finding that the CIA activities were illegal, alluding to terrorism, and several other clandestine events in US history. Here is a heirarchy of information and reasearch which I created a few years ago, most never go beyond the first step, few ever get to the last, deepest step of study: Stage Source Example Deepth, Breadth, Commitment 1 Pop culture partisans [Michael Moore]], [Sean Hannity]], [Bill O'Reilly]] Least depth of information. Broad but shallow. Little commitment needed 2 Web blog partisans Commondreams.org, Frontpagemag.org . 3 Written partisans Chomsky . 4 Broad historical partisans [Howard Zinn]]; A Patriot's History of the United States : From Columbus's Great Discovery to the War on Terror by Larry Schweikart and Michael Patrick Allen . 5 Specific historial partisans Inevitable Revolutions, The United States in Central America; Benevolent Assimilation . 6 Specific historial non-partisans . . 7 Source material of historians Congressional records, Original historical documents Greatest Depth of information. Deep but narrow. High commitment needed.

At this point, I am a little burned out by researching to that depth ("7" in my graph). "Committee reports or hearing transcripts" will not explain the intense lobbying that may have gone on behind closed doors to get this passed. Unfortunatly, there may not be a record of this. Thank you again for your fabulous suggestions. Ikip (talk) 13:50, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Simple explanation

This:

The McCarran-Ferguson Act, 15 U.S.C. § 1011, is a United States federal law that exempts health insurance companies from the federal anti-trust legislation that applies to most businesses[1]

From the little I have read, is a vast simplification of exactly what this Act does. Ikip (talk) 13:56, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Any reference to McCarran-Ferguson as an "anti-trust exemption" is a gross oversimplification. In fact, McCarran-Ferguson's anti-trust exemption is more limited in scope than its exemption from almost every other federal law. And any reference to health insurance in particular smacks of a talking point. McCarran-Ferguson does not treat health insurance any differently from any other line of insurance, though that may soon change. Xrlq (talk) 18:42, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

Controversy section makes no sense

It appears to have been written by a schizophrenic. Who's Castro? If it's Fidel Castro, what the hell is he doing in an insurance law article? Why is some New York treaty of general application relevant to a federal act regarding insurance? If it's not fixed soon, I'll purge that garbage. --Coolcaesar (talk) 07:17, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

I agree with Coolcaesar that the "Controversy" section makes no sense. I am an attorney who works with the New York Convention on a daily basis, and I can say that there is no connection whatsoever between the McCarran-Ferguson Act (concerning the regulation of insurance) and the New York Convention (on the recognition and enforcement of foreign arbitral awards). I recommend deleting the "Controversy" section of the article. 68.33.155.19 (talk) 02:07, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm going to delete it, no one has objected. --Coolcaesar (talk) 12:33, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

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