Category Archives: Lifestyle

Insurers Will Pinch Hit for Religious Institutions to Pay for Contraceptive Care

In order to satisfy the needs of religious institutions that balked at the prospect of having to pay for birth control for their employees under the new Obama health care law, the Obama administration came up with a compromise proposal in which health insurance companies would foot the bill for the free service.

Free Birth Control For All

According to Obama’s 2010 healthcare law, birth control must be made available to workers for free. Houses of worship are exempt from this particular aspect of the law, but the coverage is required to be made available to all employees of religiously affiliated institutions such as hospitals and universities.

Although the cost of birth control is minimal and footing the bill for this service is not expected to hurt insurance companies in any meaningful way, there is still a question of the principle involved in forcing them to pay for something that there is no easy way to recoup the expense.

“We are concerned about the precedent this proposed rule would set,” said Robert Zirkelbach, spokesman for America’s Health Insurance Plans, the industry’s trade group. “As we learn more about how this rule would be operationalized, we will provide comments through the regulatory process.”

Zirkelbach said insurers “have long offered contraceptive coverage to employers as part of comprehensive, preventive benefits that aim to improve patient health and reduce health care cost growth.”

Cost Shared in Past

In the past when employers signed on for health plans that provided birth control in their packages it was understood that the employer paid for part of the cost of birth control, while employees also paid for part of the bill through their co-payments.

The new law, however, does not permit health insurers to raise premiums, charge co-payments or deductibles to help cover the cost of contraceptives.

Free Contraception is Cost Effective

Thomas Carroll, an analyst who covers health insurance companies for Stifel Nicolaus, said that, “in the grand scheme of things, it doesn’t seem like a material cost to be added to the managed care company or the employer. Any services that are mandated are ultimately covered in the premium, either to the specific group or to the system in general.”

The Obama administration asserted that any extra expense they may have due to offering free birth control care will be made up with the savings they will have from not having to deal with unintended pregnancies.

Insurance industry critc Wendell Potter concurred. “Providing contraception, even for free is cost-effective for insurers so I don’t think they’ll balk,” he said, adding it could even save them money in the long run. It may add a little administrative complexity to what they do, but they can deal with it.”

Loose-Lipped Consumers Bring Joy to Retailers

Consumers will share personal information for a better shopping experience

The results of a survey conducted by IBM on 28,000 people in 15 countries showed that people are much more willing to share personal information if they believe in return they will get a more personalized shopping experience.

People are willing to divulge more about themselves with their favorite merchants, from their food allergies to their home addresses. This survey’s conclusions were met with pleasure by the business world as companies are constantly looking for ways to target the perfect demographic of shoppers with their latest creations.

“They are willing to share information if there is perceived benefit,” said Jill Puleri, global retail leader of IBM’s  global business services. “It doesn’t have to be monetary benefit.”

There is still a certain hesitation from consumers all over the world about giving their personal financial information, like their incomes; but other private information is almost there for the asking.

One example is that about 75% of the people in the survey were ready to reveal details about how they use media such as television, like which TV shows that watch. A similar number had no problems telling what ethnic group they were members of.

A somewhat smaller group, 61% were comfortable sharing their names and addresses with retailers. For 59% of the people questioned it was not a problem to describe lifestyle-related information such as how many cars they own, if they live in a new home, or if they had just had a child.

“These are things that I think are pretty important to a retailer,” Puleri said, adding that the change in shopper behavior was phenomenal.
“We have always thought the consumer was pretty guarded with their information,” Puleri added.

Flying Has Never Been Safer

Flying is Safer Now More Than Ever

The last ten years has seen an enormous improvement in the safety of commercial flying, reports the Associated Press after analyzing government data on aviation accidents.

Ten years ago flying was already scoring record marks for safety, but over the past ten years the safety statistics have improved remarkably. The United States had a total of 153 air accident related fatalities, which comes to two deaths for every 100 million passengers on commercial airline flights. Ten years before that the numbers were ten times higher, but still considered safe.

At the beginning of what is called the ‘jet age’ the chances of death while flying on commercial planes was at its highest; with 1, 696 deaths from 1962 until 1971. That’s 133 out of every 100 million passengers. Terrorist acts were not included in the figures.

The safety of flying is truly astounding, especially if you compare it to an activity almost all of us engage in just about every day- driving. These numbers tell us that people are much more likely to die on their way to the airport than flying across the country. In one year, on average, there are about 30,000 automobile related deaths. That is a mortality rate eight times higher than for flying in planes.

“I wouldn’t say air crashes of passenger airliners are a thing of the past. They’re simply a whole lot more rare than they used to be,”

says Todd Curtis, a former safety engineer with Boeing and director of the Airsafe.com Foundation.

Survey Shows Shoppers More Tight-Fisted This Holiday Season

According to a survey conducted by Triton Digital, this year’s holiday season shoppers are searching for deep price cuts on their purchases and are planning on spending less this year than in other years. They are striving to avoid the use of their credit cards, too.

Spending Less and Using Cash

The survey questioned over 47,000 consumers from North America during the month of November. The results showed that 61.5 percent are planning to spend less than they did last year on gifts, while 16.3 percent said that they are not planning on giving gifts at all this year.

Fifty-two percent of those interviewed also said that they are planning on using cash exclusively to pay for the gifts they buy, while 14.5 percent are going to use a “layaway” plan in order to spread out the cost of their purchases over time.

Bargain Hunters on the Prowl

The quest for a good deal is also taking on a more important part of the shopping experience, with 34.3 percent planning to go shopping on Black Friday. Twenty-two percent are planning to check for discounts and special deals in order to pay less.

Despite the difficult times, about 51.6 percent of consumers are still planning on giving to charities, while 9.8 percent said they will be making all their holiday purchases on-line.  Gift cards will be bought by about 26.1 percent of consumers, according to the survey.

Staying Home, Too

The Triton survey also asked if consumers are planning on taking a vacation, or traveling this holiday season. Only 7.4 percent answered in the affirmative, the vast majority saying that they are planning on staying home with their immediate families instead.

“It’s clear that consumers are looking for deals this holiday season, through both traditional means like in-store Black Friday shopping and new channels like daily deal sites,” said Chris Bell, president of Triton Digital Applications and Services. “There is a huge opportunity here for brands and media companies to offer incentives, deals and rewards for loyalty to capitalize on this consumer trend.”

Black Friday Bargains and Extended Hours Boost Sales for Retailers

The day after Thanksgiving is known to retailers and consumers as Black Friday. On this day smart shoppers take to the malls in droves, gearing up for the Christmas giving season with slashed prices only available on this special day.

Consumers can expect highly reduced prices on everything from toys, clothing, electronics, and much more.

According to BlackFriday2011.com, a type of WikiLeaks for serious Black Friday shoppers who want to see advertisements before they get published, there is expected to be 220 million people bargain hunting this coming Friday, up from 212 million last year.

Black Friday is incredibly important to retailers. SpendingPulse, a market analysis outlet, estimates that Black Friday business is worth as much as $20 billion in sales, with many of the largest shopping outlets opening earlier with extended hours.

Toys R Us is planning on opening at 10pm on Thursday night, just enough time to barely digest the Thanksgiving Turkey. Sears will be open on Thursday morning, interfering with consumers’ ability to watch the annual Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade; and Walmarts is not taking any closing time at all.

“They’re all trying to take market share away from each other,” Cynthia Groves, head of global retail consulting at Newmarket Knight Frank in Washington.

The longer hours for the shops has many people complaining, and is not seen universally as a good thing:

“It’s a national holiday, not a national shopping day,” wrote one signer or a petition to not open Target at midnight on Friday morning. “Encouraging people to shop in the middle of the night is bizarre,” added another petitioner.