#health insurance companies mississippi

[epgbenefits]

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[anarchywoofwoof]

it's been a while since i've done a particularly egregious ACAB post, so i guess it's about time. trigger warning for racist violence, death and police brutality.

on March 14th, 2023, in Hinds County, Mississippi - the most populous county in the State of Mississippi, an area i used to dispatch tow trucks to for a roadside emergency service company and know well - Bettersten Wade reported Dexter Wade, her 37-year-old son missing.

what Dexter's mother did not know at the time and would not know until an unacceptable and heart wrenching 172 days later is that 9 days prior, on March 5th, 2023, Dexter had been killed less than an hour after he’d left home, struck by a Jackson, Mississippi police vehicle as he attempted to cross a nearby interstate highway.

police knew Dexter's name, and Bettersten's, but did not contact her and the body went unclaimed for months in the county morgue.

the following October, she was directed to the Hinds County penal farm to meet a Sherriff's Deputy, who lead them into fucking woods, where her son was buried in a grave simply marked with the number "672"

now, after the police neglectfully took this man's life, failed to inform his family, and attempted to cover it up... it turns out that his wallet with his home address, a credit card and a health insurance card was in the front pocket of his jeans at the time of his death.

this is after the Hinds County coroner's office reported that they did not find identification on Dexter Wade's body, but found his name on a bottle of prescription pills that they used to ID him several days later. undoubtedly, this was to provide police ample time to cover up their tracks.

the Mayor of Jackon, MS, Chokwe Antar Lumumba (a self-described Progressive, Socialist and "political revolutionary") said last month that Wade was "without ID" and that police were unable to identify him.

this is about to get, somehow, more fucked up.

in addition to the disrespect shown already to Dexter Wade, his family and his memory, officials from the State of Mississippi exhumed his body on Monday without his family in attendance.

On Monday, authorities exhumed Wade's body following calls for an independent autopsy and funeral. But his family said officials failed to honor the agreed-upon time approved by a county attorney for exhuming the body. “Now, I ask, can I exhume my child and try to get some peace and try to get a state of mind,” Bettersten said. “Now y’all take that from me. I couldn’t even see him come out of the ground.” Civil rights and personal injury attorney Ben Crump told USA TODAY Wade's mother was notified last week by the attorney for the Hinds County Board the exhumation would be at 11:30 a.m. Monday. The family, along with their attorneys, members of the media and community advocates had planned to attend, but Crump said Wade’s body was exhumed at 8 a.m., hours before the scheduled time and without notice. “There is no excuse for the way this case has been handled. Every time Ms. Wade takes a step toward getting answers as to what happened to her son, Jackson officials bring her two steps back,” Crump said.

this is a heavy post. but as usual, the point here is: the institutions we currently in place throughout this country are corrupt, soulless and have no respect for you in life or death. the state and the police are corrupt and will kill you - intentionally or unintentionally - and then bury the evidence as deep as they possibly can. and the slime will insulate them from within. it's unacceptable. it cannot be reformed.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

This political cartoon by Louis Dalrymple appeared in Judge magazine in 1903. It depicts European immigrants as rats. Nativism and anti-immigration have a long and sordid history in the United States.

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

March 28, 2024

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

MAR 29, 2024

Yesterday the National Economic Council called a meeting of the Supply Chain Disruptions Task Force, which the Biden-Harris administration launched in 2021, to discuss the impact of the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge and the partial closure of the Port of Baltimore on regional and national supply chains. The task force draws members from the White House and the departments of Transportation, Commerce, Agriculture, Defense, Labor, Health and Human Services, Energy, and Homeland Security. It is focused on coordinating efforts to divert ships to other ports and to minimize impacts to employers and workers, making sure, for example, that dock workers stay on payrolls. 

Today, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg convened a meeting of port, labor, and industry partners—ocean carriers, truckers, local business owners, unions, railroads, and so on—to mitigate disruption from the bridge collapse. Representatives came from 40 organizations including American Roll-on Roll-off Carrier; the Georgia Ports Authority; the International Longshoremen’s Association, the International Organization of Masters, Mates and Pilots; John Deere; Maersk; Mercedes-Benz North America Operations; Seabulk Tankers; Under Armour; and the World Shipping Council.  

Today the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Highway Administration announced it would make $60 million available immediately to be used as a down payment toward initial costs. Already, though, some Republicans are balking at the idea of using new federal money to rebuild the bridge, saying that lawmakers should simply take the money that has been appropriated for things like electric vehicles, or wait until insurance money comes in from the shipping companies. 

In 2007, when a bridge across the Mississippi River in Minneapolis suddenly collapsed, Congress passed funding to rebuild it in days and then-president George W. Bush signed the measure into law within a week of the accident. 

In the past days, we have learned that the six maintenance workers killed when the bridge collapsed were all immigrants, natives of Mexico, Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador. Around 39% of the workforce in the construction industry around Baltimore and Washington, D.C., about 130,000 people, are immigrants, Scott Dance and María Luisa Paúl reported in the Washington Post yesterday. 

Some of the men were undocumented, and all of them were family men who sent money back to their home countries, as well. From Honduras, the nephew of one of the men killed told the Associated Press, “The kind of work he did is what people born in the U.S. won’t do. People like him travel there with a dream. They don’t want to break anything or take anything.”  

In the Philadelphia Inquirer today, journalist Will Bunch castigated the right-wing lawmakers and pundits who have whipped up native-born Americans over immigration, calling immigrants sex traffickers and fentanyl dealers, and even “animals.” Bunch illustrated that the reality of what was happening on the Francis Scott Key Bridge when it collapsed creates an opportunity to reframe the immigration debate in the United States.

Last month, Catherine Rampell of the Washington Post noted that immigration is a key reason that the United States experienced greater economic growth than any other nation in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. The surge of immigration that began in 2022 brought to the U.S. working-age people who, Director Phill Swagel of the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office wrote, are expected to make the U.S. gross domestic product about $7 trillion larger over the ten years from 2023 to 2034 than it would have been otherwise. Those workers will account for about $1 trillion dollars in revenues. 

Curiously, while Republican leaders today are working to outdo each other in their harsh opposition to immigration, it was actually the leaders of the original Republican Party who recognized the power of immigrants to build the country and articulated an economic justification for increased immigration during the nation’s first major anti-immigrant period. 

The United States had always been a nation of immigrants, but in the 1840s the failure of the potato crop in Ireland sent at least half a million Irish immigrants to the United States. As they moved into urban ports on the East Coast, especially in Massachusetts and New York, native-born Americans turned against them as competitors for jobs.

The 1850s saw a similar anti-immigrant fury in the new state of California. After the discovery of gold there in 1848, native-born Americans—the so-called Forty Niners—moved to the West Coast. They had no intention of sharing the riches they expected to find. The Indigenous people who lived there had no right to the land under which gold lay, native-born men thought; nor did the Mexicans whose government had sold the land to the U.S. in 1848; nor did the Chileans, who came with mining skills that made them powerful competitors. Above all, native-born Americans resented the Chinese miners who came to work in order to send money home to a land devastated by the first Opium War.

Democrats and the new anti-immigrant American Party (more popularly known as the “Know Nothings” because members claimed to know nothing about the party) turned against the new immigrants, seeing them as competition that would drive down wages. In the 1850s, Know Nothing officials in Massachusetts persecuted Catholics and deported Irish immigrants they believed were paupers. In California the state legislature placed a monthly tax on Mexican and Chinese miners, made unemployment a crime, took from Chinese men the right to testify in court, and finally tried to stop Chinese immigration altogether by taxing shipmasters $50 for each Chinese immigrant they brought.   

When the Republicans organized in the 1850s, they saw society differently than the Democrats and the Know Nothings. They argued that society was not made up of a struggle over a limited economic pie, but rather that hardworking individuals would create more than they could consume, thus producing capital that would make the economy grow. The more people a nation had, the stronger it would be.

In 1860 the new party took a stand against the new laws that discriminated against immigrants. Immigrants’ rights should not be “abridged or impaired,” the delegates to its convention declared, adding that they were “in favor of giving a full and efficient protection to the rights of all classes of citizens, whether native or naturalized, both at home and abroad.”

Republicans’ support for immigration only increased during the Civil War. In contrast to the southern enslavers, they wanted to fill the land with people who supported freedom. As one poorly educated man wrote to his senator, “Protect Emegration and that will protect the Territories to Freedom.”

Republicans also wanted to bring as many workers to the country as possible to increase economic development. The war created a huge demand for agricultural products to feed the troops. At the same time, a terrible drought in Europe meant there was money to be made exporting grain. But the war was draining men to the battlefields of Stones River and Gettysburg and to the growing U.S. Navy, leaving farmers with fewer and fewer hands to work the land. 

By 1864, Republicans were so strongly in favor of immigration that Congress passed “an Act to Encourage Immigration.” The law permitted immigrants to borrow against future homesteads to fund their voyage to the U.S., appropriated money to provide for impoverished immigrants upon their arrival, and, to undercut Democrats’ accusations that they were simply trying to find men to throw into the grinding war, guaranteed that no immigrant could be drafted until he announced his intention of becoming a citizen. 

Support for immigration has waxed and waned repeatedly since then, but as recently as 1989, Republican president Ronald Reagan said: “We lead the world because, unique among nations, we draw our people—our strength—from every country and every corner of the world. And by doing so we continuously renew and enrich our nation…. Thanks to each wave of new arrivals to this land of opportunity, we're a nation forever young, forever bursting with energy and new ideas, and always on the cutting edge, always leading the world to the next frontier. This quality is vital to our future as a nation. If we ever closed the door to new Americans, our leadership in the world would soon be lost.”

The workers who died in the bridge collapse on Tuesday “were not ‘poisoning the blood of our country,’” Will Bunch wrote, quoting Trump; “they were replenishing it…. They may have been born all over the continent, but when these men plunged into our waters on Tuesday, they died as Americans.”

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[mekkajayy]

NaCl in Louisiana?? What does this even mean?

How are Southeast Louisiana homeowners, businesses, and communities affected by the Mississippi River Saltwater Intrusion?  

Residents of Southeast Louisiana will face hardship as a result of the saltwater contamination. The Mississippi River today provides sustainable drinking water for thousands of people, but future salt water contamination will render the water unfit to drink. Residents who are uninformed of the hazards of salt water may believe that boiling the water will remove the salt, but science suggests that this is not the best course of action. Business owners, particularly those in the fast food industry, will be affected. Water is utilized for cooking and cleaning, however due to the high salt concentration, companies may be forced to close temporarily. The high salt water percentage in the Mississippi River also poses a significant risk to homeowners. The saline water has the ability to corrode the pipelines in the water system. Salt water can hasten pipe corrosion in water distribution systems. Saltwater intrusion, according to health officials, could erode lead and galvanized steel pipes, potentially leaking heavy metals into drinking water, depending on how long the situation lasts. As a result of the repair damage, many homeowners' insurance premiums will rise.

Do you believe the saltwater intrusion is currently being handled appropriately? 

Emergency management officials have been collaborating for weeks and moving with deliberate speed on various plans to dilute the salt in water systems, including the construction of costly pipelines, rushing in fresh water from further upriver, implementing saltwater extraction equipment, and augmenting the underwater dams. In response to salt water contamination, Jefferson Parish leaders plan to construct four temporary water lines on the West Bank and five on the East Bank.

Why do you think some people are hesitant to trust authorities about the saltwater intrusion issue? 

Because of the absence of security, I believe people are afraid to trust officials with the salt water poisoning. Officials are merely warning people about the hazards of the salt water crisis while giving few resources or plans for managing it. In response to environmental concerns, individuals flood grocery stores in search of water, believing they will go without. Lack of security stems from the Flint, Michigan water catastrophe; some residents are still without safe drinking water. The lack of help provided to inhabitants of Flint, Michigan does not set a good example for other U.S citizens. 

References

Brand, E. (2023, October 5). Metro area businesses prepare for saltwater intrusion challenges. WDSU. Retrieved October 30, 2023, from https://www.wdsu.com/article/metro-area-businesses-prepare-for-saltwater-intrusion-challenges/45311947

Hudson, B. (2023, February 15). 'Flint is not fixed': Activists demand change years after water crisis started. FOX 2 Detroit. Retrieved October 30, 2023, from https://www.fox2detroit.com/news/flint-is-not-fixed-activists-demand-change-years-after-water-crisis

[fredseibertdotcom]

 Fearless. Three stories. 

Bob Pittman was my boss (I wrote about Bob as one of my mentors here), the one who gave me a lifetime career in television, when I was positive I was going to be a record producer. Like great bosses can sometimes do, he drove me nuts on more than one occasion (God knows how many times I annoyed him!), but more often than not gave me the rope to hang myself (thanks Bob!). But over the years I watched him succeed over and over and I finally have had enough distance to see...

...that Bob is fearless. A fearless competitor, fearless leader, fearless mentor, probably a fearless flyer. It’s one of the many qualities of Bob’s that’s brought him from radio and MTV to the heights of media.

I had a first hand look on this numerous times, with Bob as a boss, then a client, and finally as a friend. Here are three stories that not only have stuck with me for the past 40 years but have affected my own behavior, but personal and professional ever since.

1.

Very early on at MTV Networks, we had a management offsite meeting in Montauk. I’m not much of a joiner and not a drinker, but one night I found myself in a packed car of party co-workers; seven folks in a car meant for five. I was stuffed in the back with Bob and someone sprawled across our laps. 

You have to know how isolated Montauk is, and at night there are no streetlights, and here we were barreling through the darkest of roads. Suddenly, Bob leaned forward and put his hands over the driver’s eyes.

“We did this all the time at home in Mississippi. No one ever got hurt!”

I wasn’t so sure his luck was going to hold.

The woman on my lap leaned in close and said, “That’s what I like about Bob. He’s fearless.”

.....

2.

Bob was 25, I was 27, he was my boss as the head programmer at The Movie Channel, a start up, early cable channel owned by Warner Amex Satellite Entertainment (WASEC), a joint venture between two huge corporations, Warner Communications and American Express. Every expense was heavily scrutinized for efficiency and effectiveness, and my first production assistant was brought on as a freelancer only. He was creative, smart and funny, if a little disorganized.

A few months in he up and quit. “I’ve got an eye disease, I’ll be legally blind in a few months. I’m going to go live with my parents and I’ve sold my comics.” He’d been collecting since he was in grade school.

It came out that his vision was kind of like being underwater with eyes open and the degeneration would stop at a certain point. Reading was possible but only with a machine that could take books and papers and blow the type up by several inches. Insurance would pay for it, but he was a freelancer with no coverage.

“Well, I’m not going to let you quit. Your problem isn’t your vision, you’re just a little messy and undisciplined. Let's see what I can do.”

Back in the day, corporate health insurance wasn’t as computerized and organized –or quite as necessary– as it is now and maybe I could pull a weasel move and back date him as an employee for health coverage and get him his machine. I didn’t know Bob all that well, we’d met through my first media mentor, but he seemed like a real corporate type –at least compared to me– and he’d have to clear it.

I held my breath and launched into the PA’s issue.

“It’s simple, backdate his employment, get him insurance.”

The PA stayed, got his gizmo, and legally blind or not went on to become the company’s worldwide creative director for sister channel Nickelodeon.

Bob wasn’t a corporate weasel after all, he was a fearless warrior for his people.

Bob in MTV days, with a frame from Silver Cloud Productions’ “Dot to Dot”

.....

3.

A month into my gig at The Movie Channel, Bob announced The Music Channel and asked me to lead the creative efforts of the channel-to-be. He had a clear vision of a format that would be, exclusively, music videos 24 hours a day, interrupted occasionally by “VJs.”

“So,” I asked Bob, “what else will be in the clock? Jingles, like Top 40 radio?” I hoped not, but I couldn’t really picture anything else.

“No! Are you kidding? NO!!! We’ll do animated logos.” Remember, we didn’t have a name no less a logo.

He could tell I was a little confused. “What?”

“Imagine this.” He was already sounded triumphant. “There’s an animated cow grazing around. All of sudden! An axe comes of of nowhere and cuts off its head. The head falls to the ground, veins spurting blood. The cow vomits! And in the vomit is our logo!!!”

Wow, I thought. Bob will let me do whatever I want!

Bob’s creative fearlessness was the beginning of a change in television that would reverberate for decades.

By the way, we’d never produce the vomiting cow, but...

"Bessie the Cow" by Tom Pomposello from fredseibert on Vimeo.

[vague-humanoid]

In response to the Supreme Court's decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health, which invalidated the constitutional right to an abortion that was in place for almost 50 years, several dozen prominent corporations have announced new health care policies. While the details vary, these companies say they will cover travel costs for employees that need an abortion but are unable to obtain one locally. 

Abortion is already banned in 8 states (Alabama, Arkansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, Oklahoma, South Dakota, and Utah) and will be banned in 6 additional states within a month (Idaho, Mississippi, North Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, and Wyoming). Other states are expected to ban abortion soon. 

While corporate policies that cover out-of-state travel expenses for an abortion may benefit some people, there are problems with this approach. Depending on how the policies are implemented, employees may have to sacrifice their privacy to take advantage of the travel benefit. Some employees, such as single parents or those responsible for the care of an elderly relative, may not have the flexibility to travel. 

More broadly, most employers do not plan on offering this benefit. A May 25 survey found only 5% of companies planned to provide "supplemental insurance to cover out-of-state reproductive care" if Roe was overturned and just 4% would "[c]over [the] complete cost of travel to [a] healthcare facility." The nation's largest employer, Arkansas-based Walmart, which employs 2.3 million people, has not announced a policy to cover out-of-state abortions. The same goes for many of the country's other largest employers, including FedEx, Home Depot, UPS, and Target. Also left out are contract workers, students, and the unemployed.

In other words, these policies are a very poor substitute for a legal right to an abortion. Nevertheless, many companies that are announcing policies to cover travel costs for out-of-state abortions are funding political groups dedicated to further undermining abortion rights. 

Match Group, the Dallas-based company which operates popular dating sites including Match, Tinder, Hinge, and OK Cupid, established a fund to cover the costs of out-of-state abortions after Texas banned most abortions last year. CEO Shar Dubey sent this message to Match Group's 2500 employees in September 2021:

I immigrated to America from India over 25 years ago and I have to say, as a Texas resident, I am shocked that I now live in a state where women’s reproductive laws are more regressive than most of the world, including India. Surely everyone should see the danger of this highly punitive and unfair law that doesn’t even make an exception for victims of rape or incest… …[T]his particular law is so regressive to the cause of women’s rights that I felt compelled to speak publicly about my personal views. I also wanted to let you know that I am setting up a fund to ensure that if any of our Texas-based employees or a dependent find themselves impacted by this legislation and need to seek care outside of Texas, the fund will help cover the additional costs incurred.

But in 2021, Match Group also donated $137,000 to the Republican Attorneys General Association (RAGA). Why does that matter? RAGA, by its own admission, played a central role in Dobbs. Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch (R), a member of RAGA, was in charge of the legal strategy to eliminate the constitutional right to an abortion. 

In a fundraising email last Friday, RAGA pledged that future donations would be used to further undermine abortion rights across the country. "These battles to protect the unborn will now take place at the state level, where the courageous conservative leadership of Republican Attorneys General has never been more critical," the email says. "Every donation will help Republican Attorneys General combat the Democrats' pro-abortion agenda and stand tall for life."

Now that Roe has been overturned, Republican Attorneys General are already working to restrict access to abortion pills and prosecute people who assist women in obtaining an abortion. RAGA will play an important role in supporting these efforts and installing Attorneys General in more states who will work to eliminate abortion rights. 

In Wisconsin, for example, there is a statute banning abortion, enacted in 1849, that has been unenforceable since Roe. Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul (R) has said he will "not investigate or prosecute anyone for having an abortion" based on the archaic state law. RAGA, however, has already reserved $682,250 in TV ad time for spots opposing Kaul. In 2018, RAGA spent $2.8 million in an unsuccessful effort to defeat Kaul. This year RAGA is supporting Eric Toney, who has pledged to enforce the abortion ban if elected. 

Popular Information contacted Match Group and asked whether it would continue to support RAGA. The company did not respond. 

Yelp pays for abortion-related travel, stops donations to RAGA

Perhaps no company has been more openly critical of the Dobbs decision than Yelp. “This ruling puts women’s health in jeopardy, denies them their human rights, and threatens to dismantle the progress we’ve made toward gender equality in the workplaces since Roe,” Yelp CEO Jeremy Stoppelman said in a statement. “Business leaders must step up to support the health and safety of their employees by speaking out against the wave of abortion bans that will be triggered as a result of this decision, and call on Congress to codify Roe into law.” Earlier this year, Yelp instituted a policy covering out-of-state travel for abortions. 

Yelp donated $15,000 to RAGA in February 2021. But, as Popular Information previously reported, Yelp suspended its support for RAGA following revelations that RAGA helped build the crowd in DC on January 6. In response to a request for comment, Yelp told Popular Information that it does not plan to donate to RAGA in the future. The company also said that it will consider policy positions that violate its employees’ human rights before making any political contribution.

The corporations paying for abortion-related travel that back RAGA

Match Group is one of several companies that publicly announced policies to help employees access out-of-state abortion while quietly using corporate funds to support RAGA.

GoPuff

In a Friday email to its employees obtained by Popular Information, GoPuff, a food and home goods delivery service, announced its "Reproductive Rights and Access Policy." The company will "provide travel-related reimbursement up to $3,000 per medical plan year for employees and dependents enrolled in our medical plans who cannot access reproductive health care within 100 miles of their home." 

Not mentioned in the email to the company's 10,000 employees is that GoPuff donated $50,000 to RAGA on February 1, 2022. GoPuff did not respond to a request for comment. 

JPMorgan

JPMorgan announced Friday that it "is expanding travel benefits for any covered service that can only be obtained more than 50 miles from an employee’s home." The benefit, which goes into effect on July 1, includes abortion. "As always, we’re focused on the health and well-being of our employees, and want to ensure equitable access to all benefits," Trish Wexler, head of Corporate Communications for JPMorgan, told the Washington Post. 

On March 21, 2022, JPMorgan donated $25,000 to RAGA. JPMorgan did not respond to a request for comment. 

T-Mobile

In May, after the draft decision in Dobbs was leaked, T-Mobile "expanded employee benefits to cover travel costs for abortions if the procedures aren’t available locally." In a memo to employees, CEO Mike Sievert said the company was committed to meeting the "full range of your health care needs."

In 2021, T-Mobile donated $100,000 to RAGA. T-Mobile did not respond to a request for comment. 

Other corporations

Other corporations that have announced policies covering employee travel for abortion that have donated to RAGA since 2021 include AT&T ($125,000), Bank of America ($25,000), Cigna ($67,000), Comcast ($216,000), Mastercard ($25,000), and Uber ($50,000). None of these companies responded to a request for comment. 

[bergmanngustafsson65]

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[ovpwebnetwork]

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

October 17, 2023

Media Contact:

Danny Wimmer

Michigan Joins Settlements to Resolve Data Security Errors with ACI Worldwide and Inmediata

LANSING – Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel announced two settlements today involving financial and healthcare technology companies ACI Worldwide and Inmediata. ACI Worldwide is a large-scale payment processing company, Inmediata a healthcare clearinghouse that facilitates financial and clinical transactions between healthcare providers and insurers.

“We must rely on organizations such as these to secure our financial and personal data to a reasonable and robust standard,” said Nessel. “I am happy to join my colleagues in protecting consumers and holding corporations accountable when they violate that trust.”

ACI Worldwide Settlement

Michigan joined a coalition of 48 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico in announcing a $10 million settlement with payment processor ACI Worldwide over a 2021 testing error that led to the attempted unauthorized withdrawal of $2.3 billion from the accounts of mortgage holders. Michigan will receive $246,258.97 from the settlement. A private class action settlement is providing restitution to persons affected by the testing error. Affected Michigan residents who may wish to submit claim forms must do so by November 13th, and more information on the class action settlement is available here.

ACI Worldwide is a payment processor for Nationstar Mortgage, known publicly as Mr. Cooper. On April 23, 2021, ACI was testing its Speedpay platform. Due to significant defects in ACI’s privacy and data security procedures and its technical infrastructure related to the Speedpay platform, live Mr. Cooper consumer data was entered into the system. This resulted in ACI erroneously attempting to withdraw mortgage payments from hundreds of thousands of Mr. Cooper customers on a day that was not authorized or expected. The error impacted 477,000 customers, some of whom were forced to incur overdraft or insufficient funds fees.

State regulators, including Michigan’s Department of Insurance and Financial Services, have entered into a separate agreement with ACI for an additional $10 million. The regulators’ settlement also orders ACI to take steps to avoid any future incidents, including requiring the company to use artificially created data rather than real consumer data when testing systems or software and to segregate testing or development work from its consumer payment systems.

Along with Michigan, the settlement was joined by the attorneys general of Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, Wisconsin, Wyoming, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico.

Inmediata Settlement

AG Nessel also announced that Michigan, along with 32 other state attorneys general, has reached a settlement with Inmediata, a healthcare clearinghouse that facilitates transactions between healthcare providers and insurers across the U.S. The settlement is in response to a coding issue that exposed patient information of approximately 1.5 million consumers for almost three years.

On January 15, 2019, the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services Office of Civil Rights alerted Inmediata that personal information maintained by Inmediata was available online and had been indexed by search engines, potentially allowing sensitive patient information to be viewed and downloaded by anyone with an internet connection.

Although Inmediata was alerted to the breach on January 15, 2019, the company delayed notification to impacted consumers for over three months and then sent misaddressed and unclear notices.

The settlement resolves allegations of the attorneys general that Inmediata violated state consumer protection laws, breach notification laws, and HIPAA by failing to implement reasonable data security.

Under the settlement, Inmediata has agreed to make a $1.4 million payment to the states. Michigan will receive $217,049 from the settlement. Inmediata has also agreed to overhaul its data security and breach notification practices going forward, including:

implementation of a comprehensive information security program with specific security requirements, including code review and crawling controls;

development of an incident response plan with specific policies and procedures regarding consumer notification letters; and

annual third-party security assessments for five years.

Indiana led the multistate Inmediata investigation, assisted by the Executive Committee consisting of Connecticut, Michigan, and Tennessee, and joined by Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Delaware, Georgia, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Puerto Rico, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Utah, Washington, West Virginia, and Wisconsin.

##

[reliablegateguardservice]

Gate Guard Service

Gate guard service is an essential service that provides a safe entrance to businesses, residential communities, industrial facilities, and other sites. They play a vital role in the safety of people and property, and need to be well-trained in security procedures and access control. RV Gate Guarding: A Great Work Camping Opportunity

This type of gate guard job is ideal for full-time RVers looking to do something different and meet some interesting people while traveling the country. It usually requires a single person or a 2-person team to live in their own RV and work 24 hours a day. Some of the jobs you can get involve oil wells, solar farms, ranches, and even exotic animal farm gates. Keep reading to get more info on the advantages of hiring a gate guard service company.

The main function of a gate guard is to monitor and record all vehicles entering and leaving the designated area. This can include logging vehicle and driver information like name, company, vehicle tag number, and rig photo. They are often paid by the hour and depending on how much they log they can earn extra income.

A good gate guard service will provide RVs with gate alarms, gate sensors, and gate monitoring software. They will also provide training and a certification to make sure you have the skills to perform the job safely and properly.

RV gate guards may be independent contractors and not be employees of the company they work for, so they do not receive traditional employee benefits such as health insurance and paid time off. They are typically given a 1099, and they must pay their own state, federal, and Social Security taxes as required by law. How to Become a Gate Guard

If you are interested in a gate guard job, research the area you want to work and find companies that hire guards. You can then apply online or request to be contacted. You can also ask to speak with current or previous guards for more information. Elite Gate Guards for Keesler Air Force Base in Mississippi

A gate guard job on an Air Force base may seem like a simple one, but it’s actually quite a challenging task. These elite gate guards have the duty of protecting Keesler from potential threats as well as serving as ambassadors for the Air Force. Go to: https://jgsecurity.com/gate-guard-services/eagle-ford-gate-guards/ to learn more about the essential services provided by a gate guard.

They are expected to maintain high standards of fitness and a positive first impression with visitors. They are trained in military protocol and must pass an interview for the position.

Gate guards may also be hired by college campuses and communities within HOAs to provide an extra layer of security at special events or activities. They can provide unarmed security to prevent vandalism and ensure a safer environment for those participating in the event.

The average salary for gate guards is $3,193,218. The range of salaries can vary significantly based on location, experience level, and skill set.

The cost of securing large-scale properties can be prohibitive for many owners and managers. In order to protect their assets, community associations are now turning to professional security solutions such as virtual gate guard systems to keep residents and their properties safe. These systems can cost up to a fraction of what it would take to employ live security personnel, and they can be backed up with robust reporting that enables the community board to easily track visitor and resident activity in real-time. Check out this link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Security_alarm for a more and better understanding of this topic.

[personalinjuryattorneyofla]

Can I File a Personal Injury Claim if It Was My Fault?

Can a Passenger Sue a Driver Who Caused a Car Accident? Yes, if the driver was at fault in the accident.

If another party causes an accident that causes injuries to another party's vehicle, their insurance policy will pay for it. If the other driver is at fault for an accident that causes significant economic damages, that means that the other party's insurance company may pay for the costs of their injuries.

If another driver causes an accident that results in serious injuries, their insurance company might pay up to $500,000 for such damages. Even if it is not the fault of the other party, the other party will be responsible for any economic damages that the injured party may incur. Are There Any Other Claims That a Third Party Can Make? If an accident was caused by a third party, are there other claims that third parties can make for damages?

While you are at it, also take a look at:

 Are Slip and Fall Cases Hard to Win in Los Angeles?

What if someone else was at fault in an accident? The answers to that question differ from state to state. If another party was negligent or at fault in the accident, it may be possible for them to pay for the damages that were their fault.

California has laws that allow accident victims to sue others for injuries that are their fault; therefore, it is possible to sue them for their wrongdoing.

When an accident is caused by someone elses negligence, if that other party causes an accident, their insurance will pay for those costs.

What exactly is an at-fault insurance policy? When someone is negligent, the other party is not held liable for the injury or death that occurs.

How to prove that an injured party caused the accident. What damages to sue for?

California is a state where it is strictly decided by whether the other party was at fault or not.

Selective attention of a man focusing on himself while a mirror is in front of his face. Personal Accident Claims – No-Fault v. At-Fault Insurance States. What insurance state do other people live in affects whether or not one of them can sue for personal injuries or whether their insurance company will pay for those injuries.

No fault states. There are very few states that do not allow individuals to sue others for personal injuries. No fault states. If someone else causes the accident, their liability insurance will pay for medical expenses.

In no-fault states, the insurance company that pays out money for injuries that others caused pays a portion of the money that is paid to them.

Personal liability insurance covers injured parties for medical expenses related to their injuries, even if the other party is not at fault.

Although you typically cannot sue the other party for additional economic damages, you are, in principle, entitled to sue them for non-economic damages, such as pain and suffering, subject to state law limits.

Personal accident insurance is expensive, especially because most drivers have health insurance.

The states that have no-fault insurance laws are as follows: New Jersey, New York, North Dakota, Mississippi.

Florida Hawaii Kansas Kentucky Massachusetts Michigan Minnesota

New Jersey is one of the 12 states that have no-fault insurance laws, which means that if another driver causes an accident, that other driver is responsible. If that other driver was negligent, then the other driver is liable for paying compensation. New York states: New Jersey, New Hampshire, Maine, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Mexico, Wyoming, South Dakota, Texas, Washington, Oregon, Michigan, Washington State, New Mexico, New York. North Dakota: No-fault states: If it is someone elses fault, that person's insurance may pay the resulting damages. Pennsylvania Utah No-Fault Insurance States: Some states require motorists to carry personal injury insurance policies that cover them for accidents that are their fault. Some states are only limited in how much their motorist insurance pays.

When a car accident in an at-fault state like California occurs, the other party may not have been negligent.

What It Takes to Prove Negligence. Negligence means that a defendant failed to take reasonable care of the injured person. That could cause that injured person to suffer some kind of harm.

It involves four elements:

Duty to Take Care – The defendant should take reasonable care to prevent harm to others.

Duty to act reasonably – The defendant failed to act reasonably because of a careless act or failure to act. It must be demonstrated that the breach of duty caused the accident.

Damages – The other party caused injuries to others by their negligent behavior. Having proximate causes helps prove that a negligent act causes someone elses injury. Whether or not a negligent party caused the accident is foreseeable, the negligence of the negligent party was causing the injury.

Negligence must be proven as an absolute fact. Even though the criminal defendant may be guilty of a misdemeanor or a felony, if the court finds that the negligent act caused the accident, the plaintiff will have a better chance of being awarded damages in a civil lawsuit based on the doctrine that the negligent act caused the accident.

Generally, juries may presume negligent defendants are guilty if something is illegal, or the court may decide to dismiss the case.

This theory applies even if the defendant failed to perform their duty of care because of a careless act or failure to act.

What the Plaintiff Must Prove. It is important that the defendant proves that their breach of duty caused the accident.

What Kind of Damages Does It Cost? It is possible that in certain circumstances, both economic damages as well as damages that are not directly related to the injuries that a defendant caused will be awarded to the injured person.

California law requires that the defendant pay damages for both economic as well as non-economic damages.

Economic Damage: These are measurable, quantifiable losses that are caused by the negligent conduct of another party. Damages that are not measurable are losses that are not monetary. (1) In a civil action against a person for the negligent behavior of another person, ""economic damages"" mean that the victim must be compensated for a reasonable amount of money lost because of their injuries.

and

(b) (ii) ""economic damages"" means monetary losses that are determined based on the facts that have occurred. ""(b) (iii) ""non-economic damages"" means damages that are determined based on the fact that a person suffered pain, suffering, inconvenience, mental distress, loss of consortium or relationships, injury to persons'reputation or humiliation or disgrace.""

Serious brain injuries include, without limitation, brain injuries.

Brain injuries are more severe than brain injuries that are caused by being struck by a truck. Burn injury. Those who are burned in the head are known as burns. If someone is seriously injured in a car accident, a medical malpractice lawyer must investigate whether it was the fault of the defendant or not. Loss (or partial or total) of a limb. Physical injury that may cause someone else to be injured. If the defendant is responsible, the amount that the defendant owes to the injured party is legally sufficient to compensate that injured party; or, if the injured person is not responsible, the injured party is protected from further damages. Injury to the back caused by falling objects. A broken bone. A fractured skull. Comparative fault laws in California. Man whose head is in his hands, while holding his head up high in his hand. Many accident victims think that if something bad happens to them, that means that all their losses are excluded.

It does not matter if everyone else is completely at fault for what happened. In certain states, if more than 50% or 51% of the accident is caused by another party's negligence, that party is not entitled to any compensation for their own negligent acts.

Some states – like Connecticut – rely heavily on the contributory negligence rule to determine who was negligent. Even if only 1% of the accident was caused by a negligent party, it does not matter whether the plaintiff was negligent or not.

State laws that enforce the contributory negligence principle are those of Alabama, Washington, D.C., Maryland, North Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia, Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Texas, Wyoming, Oregon, Washington, South Dakota, Utah, Wyoming, Montana, South Dakota, Wyoming, Utah, Oregon, Washington, West Virginia, Washington, D.C., Tennessee, Wyoming, Kentucky, Michigan, West Virginia, Wyoming, Washington, D.C., West Virginia

California is a state that accepts only a unified theory of comparative fault.

California law allows someone who is hurt even if 99% of the accident was their fault.

Depending on how much fault a driver has, the amount of damage that a plaintiff may recover will depend on how much of that driver's fault a defendant had.

For instance, a judge or a jury may decide that 90 percent of the people who caused an accident were at fault – that means that even if the other driver was responsible, the other driver would still be liable for at least 90% of the damages. Considering that even if someone causes a car accident that damages someone with $100,000, that may mean that a jury will award $10,000 instead of $100,000 ($10,000 less than 90%).

State law provides that if a person is responsible for causing an accident, the other party is responsible for paying the damages that are owed to that person. There is a two-year statute that applies to personal injury claims in California. (See Code of Civil Procedure, Section 335.1.)

Within 2 years, someone may sue someone for assault, battery, or injury, or for the death of, someone because that person acted unlawfully or neglected to protect their interests.

If a government entity is responsible for the accident, the plaintiff does not have long to sue it – it only has to be proven within six months. If a person causes an accident that causes them to suffer serious injuries, it will be very difficult to recover damages if a judge denies the claim.

[oralsurgerymississippi]

What Can You Expect To Learn During Your Oral Surgery Consultation?

If you visit us to consult, we will first discuss your needs and goals. This will allow us to decide the best method for your particular situation. We will then go over any potential dangers and adverse reactions that could be associated with the proposed treatment. We will also go over the expected timeline and any necessary aftercare steps.

During this period, it is important to ask any questions you may have or express any concerns you might have. Following the session, we'll assist you in creating an individualized plan to move forward. Our goal is to make sure you feel comfortable and confident in all aspects of the Oral Surgery process. Thank you for choosing our practice to address your health concerns. We are looking forward to working with you on achieving your desired results.

Questions To Inquire Of Your Mississippi Oral Surgeon During Your Consultation

When you go to an oral surgeon for a consultation it is crucial to have all the necessary details before making a final decision. Some questions you might want to inquire about include:

• What are the potential dangers or complications associated with the procedure? • How much experience does the surgeon have performing this procedure? • Are alternative options to the suggested procedure that are exactly as effective? • Anesthesia or sedation be employed during the procedure and if yes, which type? • What should I expect in terms of recovery time and instructions for aftercare?

The answers to these questions can provide you with an understanding of your situation and aid in making an informed decision. It is also crucial to check with your insurance company to determine the procedures and treatments that are covered. Overall, being prepared and well-informed will help ensure a successful outcome from any oral surgery.

Making Your Decision On Whether Or Not You Want To Proceed With Oral Surgery In Mississippi

If you're faced with the decision to proceed with oral surgery, it is crucial to think about all possible options, and weigh the possible risks and benefits. Discuss with your dentist and/or surgeon about any concerns you might have.

Make sure you are aware of the recovery process and any possible complications that could arise.It can also be helpful to get opinions from trusted friends and family members.

However, the ultimate choice should be taken by you in consultation with your oral surgeon. Be aware that maintaining healthy oral health doesn't just enhance our ability to eat and speak however, it could also positively impact our overall well-being. So, take a careful look at all factors before making a choice on whether or not you should go ahead with oral surgery.

[lightsmile90]

How Private Insurance/Qualified Health Plans can Save You Time, Stress, and Money.

Wellness insurance plans for individuals and loved ones before grow older 65 Need support finding a strategy? We can easily aid! For more info concerning your strategy, please explore our Patient Help Center: http://care.neweggsi.com/hc/house Health treatment providers and wellness treatment services nationwide, including Kaiser Permanente, United Health Group, Blue Cross Blue Shield of America, and Blue Cross Blue Shield of California, give similar coverage to government-sponsored strategy. Respond to a few concerns to find which insurance policy options may be on call for you. What is the variation in company between an experienced and a brand-new insurer? Some options are extra pricey every year, while others are much better managed and funded. How will certainly your insurance coverage readjust for costs in your location? How much will certainly you pay to deal with your deductible price? Where is my insurance plan from and how will it adjust for remittances in the future? What are the costs of my plan? Discover personal and loved ones insurance strategy in your condition You possess insurance coverage options with UnitedHealthcare. What's readily available In your condition Pick what services are being dealt with under your plan. The possibilities are not limited to insurance coverage insurance coverage of family members, incident, ill leave of absence, emergency, pregnancy or clinical (e.g., clinical or oral) treatment. You can easily also choose health treatment plans that cover particular other elements of health care treatment.

Explore the insurance coverage strategy available in your condition and obtain quick, totally free quotes on protection currently. When would you consider acquiring protection for an American soul attack? Center attacks are one of the 1st avoidable disorders for which physicians can take the patient to hospital for procedure. Once in a medical center, doctors may recommend medications to maintain a healthy and balanced selection of blood stream stress; aid make certain the clients are breathing, and might require demanding health care care if needed. What are the threats of center attacks? Avoid to: Alabama Alaska Arizona Arkansas California Colorado Connecticut Delaware District of Columbia Florida Georgia Hawaii Idaho Illinois Indiana Iowa Kansas Kentucky Louisiana Maine Maryland Massachusetts Michigan Minnesota Mississippi Missouri Montana Nebraska Nevada New Hampshire New Jersey New Mexico North Carolina North Dakota Ohio Oklahoma Oregon Pennsylvania Rhode Island South Carolina South Dakota Tennessee Texas Utah Vermont Virginia Washington West Virginia Wisconsin Wyoming Explore UnitedHealthcare health insurance planning 1, 3 1 lasting virtually 3 years. Premium Coverage Plans on these planning can easily be found Listed here. 2 Have additional inquiries about health insurance? Ask additional wellness experts right here. This write-up actually showed up in the Washington Post, as a unique supplement to your write-up. You may be intrigued in this article, "Obama's Plan Does Not Defintify Almost 40,000 Households.". See additionally: Obama to Finish Defibrillators Program: Acquire Help! Shopping for wellness insurance policy could deliver up some questions — like how does insurance definitely work and what selections are available? When would a individual think concerning health insurance policy? How Health Insurance of people would in fact purchase wellness insurance coverage that doesn't have preexisting conditions? Would a lot of health centers possess wellness insurance in order to cover anyone who got gotten married to? How higher would insurance costs go? Is it worth funds that you wouldn't be dealt with by the health and wellness insurance policy? Let's check right into it and receive some responses. Do you think there's a way/method that these brand new products are going to be made use of and how do you find it in technique. Some firms are actually implementing some kind of brilliant agreement unit, something like Ethereum, which permits you to trade cryptocurrencies, or like it's the first opportunity that has actually a wise contract. So it's going to be a quite intriguing task.

[apolonia102812-newsletter]

Why life insurance plays a key role in closing the racial wealth gap

Life insurance can help close the racial wealth gap within the Black community

Traditionally, life insurance was marketed to the Black community for burial expenses, not as an investment tool, and Blacks were given higher premiums for lower death benefits.

According to financial advisor Rosalyn Glenn, life insurance can be a powerful wealth-building tool — even during your lifetime.

Permanent life insurance can be a particularly good option because it never expires and there’s a cash value you can borrow against.

The coronavirus pandemic has highlighted the disparities and health inequities that fuel a lack of trust between the medical profession and the Black community. Stories of Anarcha, the Tuskegee experiment, Mississippi “appendectomies,” and Henrietta Lacks are reminders of how the medical community misused Black patients. Even today, 40% of first- and second-year medical students endorsed the belief that Black people’s skin is thicker than white people’s, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges.

Similar to the Black community’s mistrust of the medical profession, there is a mistrust of the financial industry. The FBI, under J. Edgar Hoover, said its purpose was to disrupt, discredit, and prevent the rise of a Black Messiah that would unify the Black community. And when there has been wealth in Black entrepreneurial centers like Black Wall Street and historic Beale Street, they were destroyed from racist attacks and replaced with white-owned businesses.

The economic impact of COVID-19 combined with pay inequality and institutional racism continues to create barriers to generating wealth in the Black community. But despite the setbacks of 2020 and the past, in the words of poet Maya Angelou, “still we rise.”

Closing the racial wealth gap will take time and effort on many fronts, but according to Rosalyn Glenn, a financial advisor, ensuring you have adequate life insurance coverage — and understanding how it can build wealth not only after your death but during your lifetime as well — is an important step.

‘Life insurance is for the living’

“Life insurance is for the living, not the deceased,” said Glenn, who has dedicated the past 30 years to educating and helping to build wealth within the Black community. “You want to make sure that your family is taken care of, but we’ve got to start thinking about life insurance as more than just something to bury me with.”

Glenn noted that there are three main features of life insurance:

Death benefits to leave a legacy.

Generate income over time for retirement from the cash value built up.

Tax-deferred benefits.

Glenn is passionate about educating the Black community and explaining that no matter what your income level, you can use life insurance to drive your financial plans — not just after your death, but during your lifetime too.

Glenn said that African-American baby boomers strongly believed in life insurance. “I can remember my grandparents paying the insurance man each week. But I also remember that when it was time for us to use that insurance policy, it wasn’t there because we didn’t understand how it worked.”

For years, life insurance had been marketed to the Black community as something for after you die, not as an investment tool. Recall Lorraine Hansberry’s “A Raisin in the Sun.” The family is finally able to move to a better neighborhood due to the insurance policy after the death of the father.

“For decades, it was a standard practice at some insurance companies to charge Blacks more for products and offer them small face amount burial insurance that provided little value for the premium paid,” according to Forbes. Studies show that even when they have life insurance, most African-Americans are underinsured. Many have what is known as final expense insurance that essentially covers the funeral and burial costs.

However, the benefits of life insurance as an investment tool are apparent when looking at the career of rapper and entrepreneur, Master P. He started his rap label from $10,000 his grandfather left him from a life insurance policy and now has a $250 million business enterprise. Imagine how much more could have been accomplished with more!

How to get the most out of your life insurance

Start with a budget

Glenn said, “Financial wellness is to be thoughtful about your income, expenses, and knowledgeable about your household. Everyone needs a budget and directing their income to sustain their livelihood. COVID-19 taught us what we can do without before we thought we needed.” She noted that for some two-income households, losing one income can put families below the poverty level. She recommends these steps to achieve financial wellness:

Identify what you need versus what you want.

Live within your means and establish a debt reduction plan if you are over-extended.

Start young when you’re in good health and insurance premiums are cheaper.

If you didn’t start young, start now. You may not be able to fully catch up, but you can certainly lessen the harm that could potentially be done by not making that change right now.

Have a blend of permanent and term life insurance

There are two types of life insurance: permanent life and term life. Permanent life insurance never expires and is more expensive because in addition to a death benefit, it has a cash value component that you can borrow against during your lifetime. You pay more in the early years of the policy — which makes having a budget extra important — and that earns interest creating cash value. However, the premiums decrease as you age.

Term life insurance covers a set time period only — usually five, 10, 20, or 30 years. If you die during that period, your beneficiaries get your death benefit. If you live beyond the term, you have to re-apply for insurance, which becomes more expensive the older you get.

Glenn said that only having term life insurance is not a good idea, especially for the Black community. She recommends blending permanent and term life insurance, because permanent life insurance is a tool to build wealth and leave a legacy in the Black community. She noted that traditionally due to lower-paying jobs, African-Americans have lacked other ways to build wealth, but a permanent life insurance plan is a starting point.

She said, “If you can’t afford permanent life insurance, then get a term life insurance policy with the goal of converting it before the end of the policy.” The goal is “getting us to live beyond today and think about how decisions we make now determine how we will live later in life.”

Glenn recommends “making sacrifices along the way so you’re not forced to make them at the end of life.” That is where having a permanent life insurance policy helps offer income during your lifetime — to pay for college, a second home, or fund a business.

Many people think that their employer-provided group life insurance is enough. However, Glenn notes that this “doesn’t follow you when you retire and even if you’re able to turn it into an individual plan the cost would quadruple.”

Convert your term life insurance to a permanent policy to prepare for retirement

Glenn notes that life insurance is the optimal way to prepare for retirement. She explained that you “can use life insurance to generate income for yourself in retirement because the permanent life insurance policy builds up cash value so when you’re 65 you can set it up to pay you a monthly income.”

She cautioned that she has met many 55 and 60 year olds who had term life insurance but didn’t convert it. Now they are older with health challenges and can’t afford to pay premiums to insure themselves.

Some term life policies cannot convert. For those that can convert, there is usually a window of time that you can convert. However, competing life insurance companies may offer to convert your term life policy. You do not need to submit to additional medical underwriting because your policy would convert at the health rating under the original term policy. Your health insurability is locked from the time your term life insurance became effective.

When you make the conversion from term life to permanent, understand that there are different types of permanent life insurance policies, like whole, universal, and variable life. It is important to talk to your insurance agent or financial planner about the differences between the various permanent life insurance policies to understand what works best for your situation.

Find a financial planner you trust

Glenn said, “No matter your level of income or socioeconomic status, you will need a financial advisor or planner at some point in your life as you are accumulating savings into an income stream.” She said the benefit of working with a planner is to “think strategically about what you’re trying to accomplish and plan for possible market downturns to help you ride through the storms.”

Business Insider contributor Malcolm Etheridge previously wrote: “According to the Certified Financial Planner Board, in 2019, about 1.5% of Certified Financial Planners (CFPs) in the United States were Black. To put hard numbers to it, there are just 1,355 Black CFPs out of roughly 87,000 total practitioners. Those numbers are not only dismal, they are not improving fast enough.”

Glenn understands that there is a lack of trust between the Black community and financial professionals. She recommends building a relationship with someone in the financial industry. She noted that although there is no association or website for Black financial planners and advisors, readers can browse the Brokercheck to find financial planners of color — and the CFP Board site is another great resource.

Credits: Ronda Lee

Date: Sep 16, 2021

Source: https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/life-insurance-close-the-racial-wealth-gap-2021-1

[spacestationjukebox]

Transgender people in the USA need help now!

My heart hurts. I'm not the best at describing my emotions, but that's what it feels like. The United States of America continues to single out transgender people, young and old, and become hostile for them to live in. In 2021, 28 bills have already been introduced targeting trans youth.

Arkansas legislators overrode the veto from Governor Asa Hutchinson and passed HB1570. This bill makes trans youth unable to obtain gender-affirming healthcare. Puberty blockers will be barred from trans youth who are scared of their growing bodies and hormones will be unavailable to trans minors as well. Surgeries will also be unavailable. Arkansas legislators have also introduced two bills that would ban trans students from school sports: SB354 and SJR16

Alabama's Senate Health Committee approved a bill, SB10, that would make it a felony for doctors to provide gender-affirming treatment to transgender minors. Doctors could face up to 10 years in prison.

Arizona has also joined Alabama in introducing a bill that would punish doctors for providing trans youth with gender-affirming health care. They are also introducing a bill that would make trans students unable to participate in school sports. SB1511 and SB1637.

Connecticut legislature is voting on two anti-trans sports bans that would prevent trans youth from playing in school teams "to protect women's rights": SB00324 and HB 05795.

Georgia's legislature is voting on a bill that would criminalize gender-affirming care, namely HRT and puberty blockers, for minors: HB401

Two other bills, SB266 and HB276, would prevent trans athletes from participating in school and university sports programs, even at private institutions, if passed.

Iowa's trans medical ban would prohibit gender-affirming care for minors with the exception of intersex youth if HF193 is passed.

The state is also voting on two bills that would prevent trans athletes from participating in school sports: HF184 and HF327.

Indiana is voting on two bills, both of which would bar doctors from giving gender-affirming care to trans minors: SB0224 and HB1505.

Kansas state legislature is considering whether or not to prohibit gender-affirming care like HRT and puberty blockers in two bills: SB214 and HB2210.

Kansas will also vote on SB208, a bill that will stop trans students from participating in school sports to "create fairness in women's sports."

Kentucky's HB336 would make providing gender-affirming care for trans minors illegal and protect public officials who express views against gender-affirming care if passed.

The state legislature is also debating two bills that would stop trans student-athletes from playing sports: SB106 and HB471.

Louisiana's SB 104 would make it illegal for doctors to provide gender-affirming care to minors without parental, namely gender-affirming therapy, puberty blockers, and HRT.

Minnesota is voting on three bills that would prevent trans students from participating in school sports: HF1657, HB471, and SF96.

HF 1657 would specifically criminalize trans women who try to participate in girls' sports or even try to use the locker room that corresponds with their gender rather than the sex they were assigned at birth.

HB471 and SF96 are bills that would prevent all trans students from playing on school sports teams.

Mississippi's bill that would have banned gender-affirming care for trans youth, SB2171, was killed in committee.

However, Mississippi lawmakers passed a bill that will prevent trans girls from participating in female school sports, SB2536. It is unclear whether or not the law will be signed into effect by Governor Tate Reeves.

Missouri's HB33 and SB442 would both ban doctors from treating trans youth with HRT or puberty blockers.

The state is also attempting to pass four bills that would prevent trans people from participating in school sports: HJR53, HB1184, HB1077, and HB1045.

HB1077 would specifically prohibit any state funding for schools that allow trans students to participate in school sports.

Montana is considering five trans medical ban bills, one of which would make it legal for doctors to refuse to treat any patients: HB113, HB427, SB195, SB245, and SB280

The state's HB113, HB427, and SB195 bills would prevent minors from accessing gender-affirming care like HRT, puberty blockers, and any gender-affirming surgeries like breast removal.

SB245 and SB280 would impact all transgender people in the state if passed. SB245 would allow insurance companies and healthcare providers to refuse to cover or treat trans patients on the basis of being trans.

SB280 would make it mandatory for trans people to have gender-affirming surgeries like a vaginoplasty to change their legal sex on their birth certificate and other official documents.

Montana's HB112 would require public schools to categorize sports teams based on biological sex and not allow trans people to compete.

New Hampshire's medical ban would criminalize and define gender-affirming care for trans minors as child abuse if passed: HB86

HB198 would stop trans athletes from playing school sports on the basis of preventing gender discrimination for cis women.

North Dakota is voting on HB1298, which would stop trans athletes from participating in school teams if passed.

South Dakota lawmakers voted to pass a bill that bans trans students from playing on school sports teams on March 8. Governor Kristi Noem killed the bill on March 29: HB1076.

Oklahoma may pass two bills that would prevent minors from accessing gender-affirming treatments: SB676 and SB583.

The "Save Women's Sports Act," SB331, would prevent trans athletes from participating in school sports teams if passed.

Ohio is voting on a bill that would prevent high schools, universities, and private schools to stop trans athletes from playing in school sports teams: HB61.

Tennessee's legislature is trying to pass two bills that would prevent trans youth from accessing gender-affirming care like HRT and puberty blockers: HB0578 and SB0657.

The state will also vote on two bills that prevent trans athletes in middle and high school from playing team sports: SB0228 and HB0003.

Utah's "Preserving Sports for Female Students Act," HB0302, would prevent trans students from playing sports at the high school or collegiate level.

If passed, the state's HB0092 would prevent doctors from treating trans minors with HRT or puberty blockers.

Spread this! These cannot be allowed to pass.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

The secrets of hospital bills

Today, the New York Times published an analysis of hospital pricing in the US, comparing prices charged to uninsured people, to Medicare, and to different insurers, revealing that these prices can vary up to 900%, often to the detriment of large insurers.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/08/22/upshot/hospital-prices.html

This represents a marked contrast to the story we are often told about health-care pricing in America — that large insurers use their might to negotiate lower rates from price-gouging hospitals. That might be true sometimes, but often, it’s not.

And as the Times points out, it’s not necessarily the insurers who pay those inflated prices — many insurance plans are actually run by large employers, and only administered by the insurance company. So when Cigna turns down a treatment, it’s actually your boss doing it.

That may be a nice fiction for your boss to maintain in order to deflect your ire the coverage you’re denied — but it also means that when Cigna allows a hospital to gouge it for your care, it’s your boss that pays for it — not Cigna’s shareholders.

Meanwhile, the variations in prices are simply wild. If you get a colonoscopy at University of Mississippi Medical Center, it costs $1463 if you’re with Cigna, $2144 if you’re with Aetna, and $782 if you’re uninsured.

$782!

The percentage differences are even more pronounced with small-dollar items, like a pregnancy test at Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania:

$18 if you’re with Blue Cross PA.

$58 if you’re a Blue Cross NJ HMO customer.

$93 if you’re a Blue Cross NJ PPO customer.

$10 if you’re uninsured.

There’s so much more of this. Hospital and insurance spokespeople told Sarah Kliff, Josh Katz and Rumsey Taylor that all of this was not nearly so bad as it looks, that it was taken out of context, that there’s an innocent explanation — but were unable to provide that explanation.

The reality is that it’s much worse than it looks. The data-set they were reporting on is fragmentary, drawn from the minority of hospitals that deign to comply with a bipartisan order (started under Trump, affirmed by Biden) requiring hospitals to provide this pricing data.

These are the hospitals with the least to hide, the best of the bunch, and they’re so bad. There’s repeated stories of parents being horribly gouged on rabies shots for their children, for example.

All of this puts the lie to the story of health-care as a market. A parent whose child is in need of urgent care following a wild animal attack doesn’t shop around for a deal. There’s no “demand elasticity” in rabies shots for children.

But even if a heart-attack patient in an ambulance was interested in shopping for a bargain on their care, they would be stopped cold. Hospitals and insurers treat their pricing information as trade secrets, and refuse to disclose it, even when legally obliged to do so.

That secrecy extends to your employer, who is unable to see prices even when shopping for an insurer for thousands of your co-workers. In 2018, Larimer County, CO tried to get the insurer who covered its 3,500 employees to disclose its negotiated hospital prices.

They raised the issue up to the insurance company’s CEO, who personally told them to fuck off, pay him, and forget about ever finding out how that money was being spent. They put the contract out for rebid. Of the six insurers who bid, five refused to disclose prices.

A former Blue Cross exec told the Times that they put “gag orders in all our contracts,” ensuring that no one would ever know whether they were getting ripped off.

Six months after the order that legally required hospitals to post prices, the Times contracted the ten highest-grossing noncompliant hospitals. NYU Langone told them to fuck off (“We will not be providing a statement or comment”).

They got bafflegab from Cedars Sinai: “We do not post standard cash rates, which typically will not reflect the price of care for uninsured patients.”

Penn Medicine made a funny: “Penn Medicine is committed to transparency about potential costs.”

This is not a market. Markets have prices and shoppers (not hostages). This is a racket. If you doubt it for an instant, tune into Arm and a Leg, a podcast that reveals health care’s crooked billing practices and explains how to resist them.

https://armandalegshow.com/

When I moved to America, a number of friends counselled me to take out catastrophic injury insurance and skip regular health insurance, and show up at doctors’ offices and hospitals with cash in hand, ready to bargain.

They swore up and down that they were paying less in cash money for treatment than I would pay in deductibles and co-pays for my insured coverage. It looks like they were right in many cases. But this is no way to run a healthcare system.

For one thing, it leaves people with chronic conditions out in the cold. For another, it allows the system to continue to rot, transforming into a financial institution first and a way to treat patients as a distant second.

America doesn’t have market healthcare. It has racket healthcare. The fact that Americans defend this system is frankly bizarre. Unless you’re a shareholder in this rotten system, it has absolutely nothing to redeem it.

It is a crooked enterprise that wastes trillions and delivers precious little care.

Image: Japanexperterna.se (modified) https://www.flickr.com/photos/japanexperterna/15251188384/

CC BY-SA: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/

[adelheidvonschicksal]

Hi, I saw that you were a geographer. I was wondering what that entails? Are you someone who works with GIS, do you teach...? I'm not super familiar with the field but it sounds super cool and want to know more. Sorry if that's too personal.

It’s fine! A lot of people don’t know there’s actually a lot of stuff you can do with it or if they take a class in high school they just learn capitols or something.

Most of my work currently includes GIS. I’m working in health/medical geography for my local health department currently, so I mostly track COVID-19 and other community diseases at this time, which includes making coverage maps for the city to show density of COVID-19 and hotspots so we can target certain areas for vaccinations or testings and to monitor high risk communities like schools and nursing homes and socially vulnerable areas. Then, I just help out wherever we need or do my own projects. I’m actually helping our field guys get upgraded into the digital world instead of paper lol. I have a lot of spare time right now though so I just usually practice language books, coding, or try to write since I automated a lot of my work and work from home.

My prior job was in gas utilities almost as soon as I graduated. I don’t know if you ever seen construction workers or inspectors carry around ipads while on your property but usually they’re looking at digital maps that’ll show where pipes and gaslines are on your property or surrounding area and the different information about the pipes like cast-iron vs plastic or the pressure of the gas going through. So, my job was to digitize the maps they drew in the field into a database for them to see in the future. However, I was working in Mississippi at the time because they were backed up about 10 years in data, and a lot of the time I had to read hand drawn maps all the way from the 1920’s-1940’s to redraw the districts and retire old piping so that was…painful lol but it was kind of neat to see all the old drawings from that long ago. Most of them were actually really good.

My first real job though was in college working at an insurance/infrastructure company that builds weather resistant housing and making maps and powerpoints for them to use at conferences about their services and to help write grants. And to determine damage to the areas where they had a lot of houses built up after hurricanes.

Edit: I also had a job for about 3 days with a national defense agency for the army to clean up maps and airplane zones. Absolutely hated it. Broke down, cried an hour, and quit LOL. The deadline system was very stressful and I worked remotely so internet issues and the system was gross.

Other than that, I made money tutoring and teaching my sophomore-junior year in college, and I helped teach at camps for elementary kids with Americorp. I was really popular with the little boys because I knew what fortnite was, became the favorite teacher in one day. 😂 They were really adorable.

I really enjoyed geography though and since it’s a STEM field it was mostly guys but the class itself was about 150 students in the first two years then 20 majors last two years so you get to really know everyone. The diversity level in my class was pretty decent too though, because I know in fields like that some people might worry about being the only girl or only minority etc. but I didn’t have any problems ☺️ The only thing I hated was when we went kayaking on a field trip and i didn’t know how to steer so i almost got hit by a small boat LOL but I had leaned all the way back so I didn’t get hit. So if I’m ever in a horror movie at least I can trust my reflexes.

I’m not a really woodsy type of girl though so I usually do GIS or satellite imagery, but there are a lot of different parts to geography if you do like talking to people or working outside.

Human, which is what I’d fall under because I do community things. So medical, cultural issues would be in this category.

Technical, which is GIS and working with satellite imagery, which you don’t have to be a geographer. You can actually get a certificate in this in 1-2 years. We actually learn a lot the first two years with public administration students and meteorologists so we had a few of those students also get a certificate in GIS. So if you want to be a meteorologists, it’d help to take some geography classes too because we share a lot of classes the first year or two. And we had several army students as well. You can also work in emergency agencies, like for 911 because the EMS uses a GIS system. I met a guy in Florida who does this as well as drone surveillance.

Physical, so this would be like the people that like to study mountains and plates or the terrain of specific regions.

Environmental, so your park rangers, biologists, etc. your Discovery Channel and Animal planet guys. National geographic type guys. Also, disaster management and FEMA type jobs.

I’ve had teachers that tracked diseases in south america, plotted coffee growing land in south america and travel on donkey over mountains and stuff like that to do it (this was one of my older teacher so this was decades ago), and I also had a teacher that worked with wineries and breweries about how and where to grow their products based on climate as well as did sports statistics for soccer teams for where to line up their players for their best shots. I think he said he did that for a German team. So, there is Sports Geography and agriculture to a degree if you like Sports.

You can become an urban planner, which are the people that help build and plot out areas for construction for the government, which I think is what I want to do but I don’t really want to go back to school to master in it. 😭 or you can become a travel guide or teacher. I’m thinking of being a teacher so I can get summers off to travel.

But I think geography can be applied to a lot of things since humans are always interacting with each other and the earth so even just knowing the basics can probably help answer the why in a lot of things. So the job is really really flexible but a downside is that a lot of government jobs run on contracts and grants so you might end up bouncing from job to job every few years if your contract runs out unless you work for a utilities or construction company but working for a utility company means you’ll be doing the same task everyday which is looking at the drawing the inspectors do in the field then putting them in the digital system, but I usually have no problem finding another job to go to as a lot of contract agencies will message you first especially on linkedin. However, the agencies also get a portion of your paycheck. So like if you get an offer for $23, the agency will take $5, so you’ll end up making $18 an hour. And there are some specialties that are hard to get into so I won’t say it’s easy to find exactly what you want but it does give you a lot of options if you get creative with your skillset. Overall though, I think a class in human geography helps a lot with critical thinking skills since where I live most people have to take extra science classes anyway.

If you go to ESRI website, they have a few free classes, seminars, and data you can play with if anyone is ever interested.