News & Resources

Florida Sen. Marco Rubio blasted the Obama administration recently for relaxing restrictions on travel and trade with Cuba. The change in policy, Rubio argued, ignores human rights issues that continue to exist in Cuba. Further, he said, our expanded interaction with the country will not inspire the Castro regime to change its ways. Sending tourists to Havana will not make life any easier for pro-democracy nationals. Lowering trade barriers will not force the Cuban government to curtail its use of violence in dealing with opponents or critics.

Anyone who has tried to put something together — a bookcase, a model airplane, a tool shed — knows the special frustration that comes from bad technical writing. Sometimes, the problem is a sloppy translation from the original language: “Helping is on the Internet website.” (True story.)

The enrollment period for health insurance under the Affordable Care Act closes at noon today. Chances are good that those of us who have put this off to the very last minute will have a tremendous sense of relief when it’s finally taken care of. There is a certain comfort that comes from knowing that your insurance is in place for another year.

Power and responsibility may come at a price: liability. Serving on the board of directors or as an officer of a for-profit or nonprofit organization may be lucrative or rewarding or both, but the positions also carry risk for the individual. Think about Enron: When the company imploded, officers and directors scrambled to prepare for lawsuits and criminal charges against them personally and as a group, even if they knew they had done nothing wrong.

There is a naysayer in every crowd. When you buy a fancy new car, your first indulgence in a long time, one of your friends or coworkers will point out that the car lost a third of its value the second you drove off the lot. When you buy your first house, that same person, who just happened to purchase a home last year, will not congratulate you. He will kill your excitement by tossing in a “Just wait ’til you have to replace the roof” comment.

We are discussing a Florida law about parasailing that went into effect on Oct. 1. The law requires a commercial parasailing vessel operator to carry personal injury liability insurance, with limits of $1 million per occurrence and $2 million per year. The Legislature did not stop there in its effort to protect consumers.

Florida has a new insurance law, and this one is designed to protect consumers. Effective Oct. 1, commercial parasailing operators must have personal injury liability insurance. The policy limit may not be below $1 million per occurrence with an annual cap of $2 million.

In February, the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the U.S. has jurisdiction over the lawsuits against Chinese drywall manufacturer Taishan Gypsum Co. Ltd. The court also ordered the company to pay $2.7 million to the named plaintiffs in the class action.

We are finishing up our discussion of stranger-originated life insurance policies. If history has taught us anything, it is that the idea is fraught with risk — and not the kind of risk insurance companies like to take on. When we left off, we were going through some of the ways STOLIs can actually harm the seniors involved.

The concept of insurable interest does not come up often in day-to-day discourse. Even for the Florida Office of Insurance Regulation, it must be rare to sit in meetings devoted to questions of insurable interest. A few years ago, however, that was not the case. The subject came up when the OIR launched an investigation into stranger-oriented life insurance schemes, or STOLIs.