For those not able to hear views shared by new NAIC CEO Ben Nelson before insurance executives in Washington this week at a private industry conference where he was scheduled to speak, the NAIC's homepage has now expanded to include four video segments a presentation by Nelson on issues and priorities.
Most strikingly, Nelson positions consumers back home against the bogeyman of the federal government and European supervisory system in their potential for overreach into state regulation.
Nelson, hired as NAIC CEO in mid-January, uses the phrase "back home" numerous times in the videos, set against the backdrop of the U.S. Capitol, to underscore who the state commissioners are and who they are serving.
"I am always excited about maintaining the support for the 10th Amendment (state sovereignty) when it comes to the regulation of insurance — and sometimes the regulatory interests at the federal level of having more involvement in the regulation of insurance," Nelson said.
"We don't want — there's no need — and when there's no need, there is absolutely no way that we should just acquiesce to the federal government when we realize the states do the job so well," Nelson said in the second video, Experience in Insurance Regulation. "If this system was not functioning, well maybe there might be a federal solution to some of it. But there's no federal solution required to making certain that best practices are engaged in by all the states."
The former Nebraska governor and U.S. senator (a moderate state-rights Democrat who cast the instrumental vote on the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, PPACA) also discussed facing the challenges from European regulatory officials in multiple videos.
"There is a global movement in insurance today that is much more expansive than what it was before," Nelson said in the video "On the Importance of International Dialogue." He warned that the U.S. should not allow global developments to "distract us away from our basic jobs of protecting the public back home."
