PIA Opposes Health Insurance Across State Lines
March 14, 2017House Speaker Paul Ryan said a second healthcare bill will be moved in tandem with the American Health Care Act, Ryan-led legislation to repeal the Affordable Care Act (ACA). The second bill will include a provision allowing insurers to sell health insurance policies across state lines. The National Association of Professional Insurance Agents (PIA) opposes this provision because it would strip states of their regulatory authority over insurance and undermine the foundation on which state regulation of insurance is based.
Allowing health insurance to be effectively exempt from state regulation by permitting insurers to pick their own regulator in one state—and by so doing, evade the requirements of all 49 other states—would, by federal edict, eviscerate local control.
“All insurance is local,” said PIA National Executive Vice President & CEO Mike Becker. “Permitting the designation of any one state as regulator for all states would, in essence, impose a one-size-fits-all solution dictated by Washington, D.C.—which, ironically, has been one of the main criticisms of the ACA.”