This is something you don’t see every day, namely an award of significant attorney’s fees to the prevailing defendant in an ERISA governed action. In R.I. Carpenters Annuity Fund v. Trevi Icos Corp., just decided by the United States District Court for the District of Rhode Island (but not yet up on its website),
And in Super Bowl News . . .
Well, it’s finally Super Bowl weekend, so how do we tie that into the issues covered by this blog? Easy. Here’s a terrific article in this week’s Sports Illustrated (hey, we can’t get all our reading from Aspen Publishers) on the problem of disability and health benefits – and the fact that there effectively
LaRue is Decided . . . Well, Sort of
In an opinion it issued on Monday, the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit confronted essentially the exact same facts and issues as are at play in the LaRue case currently pending before the Supreme Court, and effectively entered its own prediction as to how the Supreme Court will rule in LaRue
And Still Another View on Preemption and the Massachusetts Health Care Reform Act
I’ve noted in the past that the problem with state health care reform acts mandating health insurance is that they don’t tackle the issue that is deterring employers from providing broader health insurance benefits, namely the ever increasing and rapidly escalating cost of health insurance. In response, Massachusetts lawyer David Harlow argues on his blog
Someone Else’s Thoughts On Preemption and the Massachusetts Health Care Reform Act
People with thin skins – or who can’t laugh at themselves – shouldn’t write blogs. I got a good chuckle out of this over my morning coffee this morning.
The Lessons of the Massachusetts Health Care Reform Act’s $400 Million Shortfall
There’s a lot to be said about the preemption issues raised by state health insurance mandates and the assumptions that underlie the beliefs of those who argue that ERISA preemption should not be allowed to prevent states from experimenting with acts intended to remedy the problem of the uninsured. Articles like this one here,
Establishing Status as a Top Hat Plan in the First Circuit
At long last and after much effort, I think we may have succeeded in converting S.COTUS, the anonymous blogger on all things First Circuit at Appellate Law & Practice, into an ERISA hobbyist. How else to explain his (her?) expansive and insightful post yesterday on the First Circuit’s analysis of top hat plans in
The Governance of Retirement Plans in the Aftermath of the Subprime Meltdown
Fellow blogger Susan Mangiero and I are quoted extensively in a very interesting article, available here, in the January issue of the Institutional Real Estate Letter. The article, titled Investing in Good Governance, focuses on one of – if not the only – potential silver linings in the whole subprime mortgage mess, namely the
Supreme Court to Weigh In on Structural Conflicts of Interest
I suggested some time ago that the Supreme Court looked poised to weigh in on some of the more tempestuous ERISA issues floating around the circuit courts of appeal, and there is probably no single issue that has raised more hackles than the question of so-called structural conflicts of interest, which exists when the administrator
Niche Insurance and Government Investigations
I had two different, perhaps more substantive things in line to talk about today, but I think I am going to push them back to later in the week, to instead pass along a highly entertaining article (at least to people who really like the ins and outs and oddities of the insurance industry) that