Book Description

The absolute bottom line on wealth creation and preservation. The first financial book for the new millenium. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

Using Insurance to protect your estate
I am not a big fan of life insurance and insurance products. Having been at one time a sales rep for one of the big three insurance companies, I am acutely aware of the shenanigans that transpire.Too many young and struggling people get suckered into buying life insurance for all the wrong reasons.Barry Kaye, on the other hand, does make a strong case for insurance as an estate tool for the 'Wealthy'. People who have already amassed great wealth and are looking for a way to reduce estate taxes and leave more cash for their heirs.It's been said that while you are alive the IRS will take everything they can and when you die they will get everything they missed. How true!70-ish retireees worried about the stock market will find the advice on pensions, profit sharing, 401 (k) and IRA Maximizer very useful.Savers with low/non growth savings accounts and other similiar financial instruments that are purported to be "safe" will find a better alternative here.The book profiles 10 case studies. Case study #10-Create $6 million for $3500 a year should appeal to many.If you have already amassed great wealth and need some strategies to preserve your wealth and want to leave more to your heirs, this book is for you. If you are looking to create wealth, you will be better off with More Wealth Without Risk or You've Earned it Don't Lose it.In any event, it is interesting reading for anyone seeking to create wealth and reduce or eliminate estate taxes.

Estate Tax Planning Using Life Insurance for Wealthy People
If you are 60 or over and are worth over two million dollars, you will probably get ideas for estate tax planning from this book that your estate planning lawyer will not think of. If you are not that old or not that wealthy, the book will probably not be as useful for you. However, if you plan to be worth over two million by the time you are 60, you will find some ideas to help you get there.

One word of caution is appropriate for you here that the book does not discuss. Congress is trying to pass revisions in estate taxes that would eliminate most of the problems for which solutions are described in the book. President Clinton has vetoed that legislation recently. Keep tracking what is going on with estate taxes in Congress. Otherwise, you may be working on solving some problems that you don't have.

As a CLU (Chartered Life Underwriter) with 38 years of experience, Mr. Kaye knows all of the tricks -- certainly he knows more than any life insurance agent who has ever called on me. He also describes strategies that I have not heard from estate planners, as well. They seem sound, based on the data presented here. But you may get different numbers when you check into it for yourself, so caveat emptor (let the buyer beware).

Most of the concepts are built around the tax advantages of life insurance. It accumulates tax free and you can use it to pay your estate taxes. Unless you are wealthy, you won't have estate taxes.

Mr. Kaye wrote this book, in part, as a response to the book, Die Broke. He counters that "He who lives rich, dies rich."

If you belong to the school that you want to pile up wealth, Mr. Kaye can help you. If you belong to the school of enjoying all the wealth for yourself while your're alive, his help will be less beneficial.

People have historically used life insurance as income protection for a family. This book balances that perspective with ideas for how life insurance can help with wealth creation, estate planning, charitable giving, diversification, and risk reduction.

If you get tired of hearing a constant pitch for life insurance as the answer to all of your problems, you probably won't finish the book. But, be sure to look at the 10 case histories near the end for the case with a person whose situation is most like your own. You will probably get a useful idea or two. I suggest that you do check these ideas out with your financial advisor and tax attorney, given the changing estate tax environment, before doing anything.

Good luck with pursuing your financial goals, whatever they are!

... Read more

Book Description

The health care industry differs from most other industries in that medical pricing is primarily administered by the government and private insurers and in that it uses several types of contracts. Providers may receive a fixed sum for all necessary services within a given period of time, for the necessary services to treat a given condition, or for each specific service. The industry is changing dramatically, offering many natural experiments to aid understanding of the economics of pricing for health care.

In Pricing the Priceless, Joseph Newhouse explains the different pricing systems and how they affect resource allocation and efficiency, focusing on the efficiency of pricing. He also discusses larger issues of equity, fair distribution of burden, and social justice. Although most of the examples are American-based, the same issues arise in all medical care financing and delivery systems, and the theories and models are general enough to apply to many institutional contexts. The topics include Medicare, managed care, the contemporary integration of health insurance and medical care, the management of moral hazard and stinting, uncertainty and risk aversion, the demand for health insurance, agency relationships, information disparities, regulation, and supply-side and demand-side selection. ... Read more

Book Description

The common denominator of a growing number of hard decisions facing modern societies is the need to determine 'how safe is safe enough?'. The authors begin by defining acceptable-risk problems and analysing why they are so difficult to resolve, considering such issues as uncertainty about their definition, lack of relevant facts, conflicting and conflicted social values, and disagreements between technical experts and the lay public. Drawing on their own experience in risk management as well as the relevant research literatures, they identify and characterise the variety of methods that have been proposed for resolving acceptable-risk problems. They subject these methods to a rigorous critique in terms of philosophical presuppositions, technical feasibility, political acceptability, and validity of underlying assumptions about human behaviour. The authors construct a framework for deciding how to make decisions about risks, and offer recommendations for research, public policy, and practice. Although their principal focus is on technological hazards, their analysis applies to many risks, such as those from new medical treatments orinnovative programmes in criminal justice. The necessity of balancing risks and benefits impinges on most people's lives, and a broad audience will find this book thought-provoking and useful. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

Brilliant and insightful
This is a brilliant and stimulating book. Although it nominally concerns itself with the area of hazard management, policy and technology choices associated with loss of life or limb, it provides a great deal of insight into all forms of risk management and formal decision making.

A very well-researched book, it is obvious that the authors have not only thought long and hard about the subject matter, but have also applied a very disciplined analysis to it. Although the authors are scholars, the book is not necessarily aimed at an academic audience. While challenging, it is still approachable by the lay person.

The text does not recommend any particular methodology for decision making, but instead provides a context within which different decision making methods can be understood and evaluated. It begins by analyzing the problems confronting all acceptable risk decisions, discussing '5 generic complexities' that negatively affect all forms of formal risk analysis. Then the authors provide '7 criteria for evaluating the acceptability of approaches to acceptable risk.' The remainder of the book is spent analyzing approaches to risk management on a spectrum of empirical to formal methods, using their 7 criteria.

I found it an extremely enlightening text with applicability beyond that stated by the authors. It sheds light on many of the 'formal' methods that have been developed for areas of concern to me, specifically in the Information Security field, which often tends towards voodoo analysis based on unstated assumptions and incomplete methodologies. Although it was written over 20 years ago, it still provides a great deal of utility and insight today. One of the text's final recommendations is that the field of Risk Management be made into a formal career choice, with all of the 'formal trappings'. It is a tribute to the foresight of the authors that this is exactly what is happening today, with the emergence of the Chief Risk Officer role, trade journals devoted to the generic concept of risk, and ever greater academic attention and career training in risk management.

This is an excellent monograph on the thinking behind risk
I read this monograph years ago and lent it to someone who obviously found it equally fascinating because I've never had it back. If risk is a theme in your work, the ideas in Fischoff and Lichtenstein's book are worth reading. They offer explanations and analysis which seem to match how real people and organisations take risk decisions.END ... Read more

Book Description

As the new economy continues to emerge from the rubble created by the dot-com disaster and the events of September 11, 2001, re-insurers, carriers, and agencies, along with the five million people working in the insurance industry, are scrambling to redefine their place in the market and return to prosperity. Hard Market Selling: Thriving in the New Insurance Era provides them with the tools to do so.

Hard Market Selling guides each reader down a path of self-discovery and performance improvement. Starting with a state-of-the-industry: what’s right, what’s wrong, what needs to change, and how the changes will effect the market, the reader is challenged to cast aside traditional, "legacy" presumptions, historical performance benchmarks, and antiquated selling styles and replace them with an innovative, relationship-driven client development and service strategy that promotes value delivery, integrity, and partnership.

Novel as this approach will appear, it’s based on ten years of functional, hands-on field experience. Hard Market Selling is not another "how to" book about the process of selling and servicing products. There are already plenty of those, and none of them effectively weigh in with any remedies for the real-life, day-to-day struggles of the professionals in the insurance industry.

Hard Market Selling brings methods and motivation together in the context of the down-to-earth reality experienced by the average producer, underwriter, account executive, agency principal, and customer service representative. It is an insider’s guide for survival and achievement within an industry that is rapidly redefining itself. ... Read more

Reviews (3)

Simply Excellent
Hard Market Selling is a must read for anybody in the Insurance Industry. By far the best book that I have ever read regarding the ins and outs of selling and servicing a book of business. Scott knows his stuff! The book is very specific and offers usable tools, techniques, and strategies for production, differentiation, retention, and providing value.

Finally - a book on selling that works!
I've read so many sales and service books before - none have been as good and as useful. Hard Market Selling is making me a better producer and a better person. Thanks Scott!

It's about time
It's about time someone wrote a DEFINITIVE book on sellng Porperty and Casualty Insurance in a tough marketplace.

But hard or soft market aside, Hard Market Selling is a "MUST" book to read, hold, refer to and distribute to anyone in the sales business.

We've referred it to our 2500+ insurance agency force...and will keep on doing so, no matter the difficulty of the marketplace.

It is purely and simply the best book I've ever read on selling in our industry...or any other for that matter. ... Read more

Reviews (3)

Software is 10 day trial version only
I was disappointed to discover that RISKOptimizer software included with this book was just a 10-day trial version. After that, you have to buy the $700 license for the software. For books like this, obviously aimed to a large extent at business students, it seems much more logical to include a reduced capacity version with a perpetual license, as other similar books do.

Great non-linear optimization tool
Anyone in operations will find something of value in this book. There is a good variety of problems, and good explanations of how to solve them. The book is accompanied with Palisade.com's Risk Optimizer software. Be sure to check their web site; they post updates to software, and they seem like a pretty good company to deal with, as well.

With his various books and software, Dr Winston really helps the business manager leverage his productivity.

overall good examples, with exemption of option pricing ones
The first impression from the book was great. There are really good examples of different optimization problems - product mix, manpower allocation etc. However, missing example files from the chapters on option pricing have ruined this good impression. Without the example files (that are supposed to be on the accompanying CD) the chapters loose a good portion of their value, as the historical data are missing, which is hard to recreate and check if you understand the material right. Another bad experience with the book is the fact that CD that came with the first book that I received was damaged and completely unusable. Thanks to the Amazon.com, they sent me the second copy of the book with a new CD free of charge. But the facts are that if you buy the book, you cannot be sure that the CD is usable, and if it is, then some of the example files will be missing. In my opinion, for the price they charge for the book, you could expect a little bit more quality. ... Read more

Book Description

Think insurance has to be boring?Not now.Fundamentals of Insurance combines hands-on activities, examples from news-making companies, creative special features, and solid content.Students learn the importance of risk management, auto insurance, health coverage, and planning for retirement. Ethics in Action, Tech Talk, and World View bring the content to life and help students bridge the gap between classroom and real world applications.Liven up your classroom with Fundamentals of Insurance. ... Read more

Book Description

Praise for Risk Transfer

"Culp’s book is a masterly account of the economics of risk and the development of derivatives. It is not only soundly based in theory but it serves as a splendid practical guide to the multiplicity of traded risks in the financial markets."
–Sir Alan Walters, Chief Economic Advisor to Margaret Thatcher (1980-85 and 1989) and former Vice Chairman, AIG Trading Group (1990-2000)

"As always, Chris Culp makes me rethink things I thought I already understood.The idea he champions in this book–that derivatives can be viewed through the lens of an asset lending instrument–helps in understanding the behavior of the producers and users of derivatives.And Culp’s historical notes add color to the tapestry of risk management."
–Charles Smithson, Managing Director, Rutter Associates

"Derivatives are the highest financial life form on the planet, and Culp does a great job of explaining why. I was especially delighted by Chapter 2, which traces the way we think about risk and uncertainty from Adam Smith (who would have taught at the University of Chicago if he had been born later), through Frank Knight and Bob Lucas.It is a great reminder of why we study economics in the first place.Well done."
–Galen Burghardt, Director of Research, Carr Futures

"Chris Culp’s Risk Transfer is an important addition to the literature on derivatives, and not just because it successfully bridges theory and practice. The presentation of the underlying economic thought and academic literature relevant to the broader issues of how we view and treat risk in the economy and in the business world is excellent.It’s what makes this new book unique and valuable."
–Wendy L. Gramm, Chairman of Regulatory Studies
Mercatus Center, George Mason University

"Culp’s book explains the role derivatives play in our financial system as an invaluable tool for risk transfer in the marketplace. He takes the reader from the macro aspects of derivatives through detailed modern theories, in addition to offering a practical perspective on speculation and hedging. This book is essential for every derivatives professional."
–Dennis A. Dutterer, President and CEO, The Clearing Corporation ... Read more

Book Description

This case describes an insurance company investigation into the benefits of data mining for an anonymous Australian automobile insurance company. Although the investigation was able to demonstrate quantitative benefits of adopting a data mining approach, there are many practical issues that need to be resolved before the data mining approach can be implemented. This case provides insights into the decision-making process that is involved in exploring emerging technologies. ... Read more

Book Description

Offers protection guidelines to safeguard against misleading information when purchasing life insurance. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

none bias
It is a good book that gives you good information with out any personal biases

Poorly edited, poorly organized
The first chapter--despite its title, "Why you need life insurance"--attempts to define all sorts of life insurance jargon without explaining why someone would need this stuff. After stumbling over the fifth or sixth typo, I gave up on this book. I hope better ones are out there. ... Read more

Book Description

The objective of this book is to present this analytical framework and to illustrate how it can be used in the investigation of economic decisions under risk. In a sense, the economics of risk is a difficult subject: it involves understanding human decisions in the absence of perfect information. How do we make decisions when we do not know some of events affecting us? The complexities of our uncertain world and of how humans obtain and process information make this difficult. In spite of these difficulties, much progress has been made. First, probability theory is the corner stone of risk assessment. This allows us to measure risk in a fashion that can be communicated among decision makers or researchers. Second, risk preferences are now better understood. This provides useful insights into the economic rationality of decision making under uncertainty. Third, over the last decades, good insights have been developed about the value of information. This helps better understand the role of information in human decision making and this book provides a systematic treatment of these issues in the context of both private and public decisions under uncertainty.

* Balanced treatment of conceptual models and applied analysis
* Considers both private and public decisions under uncertainty
* Website presents application exercises in EXCEL ... Read more

Book Description

Thousands of organizations around the world have improved their performance by adhering to the ISO 9001:2000 international standards. While predominantly used in manufacturing environments, ISO 9001:2000 has applications in every industry and is rapidly becoming important to the non-manufacturing industries, too. Among these is the healthcare industry, which if judged by total revenues is one of the largest industries in the world, but has very little history of using the ISO 9000 standards. Now a few pioneering healthcare organizations are beginning to follow this standard to bring about dramatic improvements.

ISO 9001:2000 - A New Paradigm for Healthcare is the first book of its kind published for use by healthcare organizations to implement a sustainable management system. This hands-on book details the information needed by the healthcare organization for everything from writing the Quality Manual to the Self Assessment of the organization for readiness for the certification survey. Other topics covered are the Eight Keys to Implementing a Sustainable Quality Management System and a detailed analysis of how the ISO 9001:2000 Standard can be applied to an healthcare organization. A Self Assessment template is included to assist organizations in evaluating their degree of readiness in meeting the requirements. ISO 9001:2000 implementation guidelines are located throughout the book to assist the organization in meeting the requirements. ... Read more

Book Description

Provides important facts about disability insurance, the least known yet most often needed coverage. ... Read more