North Carolina Workers' Compensation Insurance Underwriters Struggling to Formulate Policy
North Carolina workers’ compensation insurance underwriters have struggled to parse news about the employment sector to determine best practices for the new fiscal year. Even the National Counsil on Compensation Insurance’s top economist has voiced consternation about a shrinking premium base. Part of the fretting has to do with the national recession. With fewer employers able to hire, fewer North Carolina workers’ compensation policies are needed. At the same time, some employers have been taking on riskier kinds of work to compensate for shrunken staffs. For instance, an independent contractor who in better times might hire out the cleaning of his industrial machinery might in the present climate take on the work himself to cut costs. By taking on potentially dangerous work that they haven’t effectively trained for, business owners may put themselves at greater risk for getting hurt (and, therefore, for filing workers’ compensation claims).
While the debate rages about whether the slumping economy may help or hurt the North Carolina workers’ compensation insurance industry, employers and workers alike have been clamoring for stability. Employers worried about volatile insurance costs will generally be more likely to hold off on hiring new employees, promoting from within, or expanding operations. (Some employers may even illegally forgo purchasing workers’ comp insurance to trim costs.) To jumpstart the North Carolina economy, therefore – particularly the industrial and manufacturing sectors — state employers need budgetary flexibility, and employees need better guarantees of their financial and physical protection.
Recession a Bane and a Boon to Workers’ Comp Writers, Insurance News Net, June 6, 2009
No Return to Normal, Washington Monthly, April 2009
More Web Resources
National Counsil on Compensation Insurance
Workers’ Comp Insurance Underwriting
