A Republican World – ‘Michigan GOP Pushing Bill To Stop You From Suing Insurance Companies That Lie’
‘On May 8, 2014, Michigan House Republicans introduced House Bill 5558, the purpose of which is to ban customers from being able to sue an insurance company for lying to them’.
‘HB 5558 would amend the state’s Consumer Protection Act of 1976, in order to prohibit consumers from being allowed to sue an insurance company, even if they lie to you about what your policy covers’.
- ‘If passed, the bill would be retroactive to March 28, 2001, meaning that any settlement obtained against an insurance company between March 28, 2001 and now would be null and void’.
‘On May 27, 2014 Michigan State Representative Rashida Tlaib posted the following statement, in regards to HB 5558’:
“House Republicans are pushing a bill (House Bill 5558) this week to amend the Michigan Consumer Protection Act to prohibit a claim against an insurance company if they lie to you”.
“This is because an injured veteran (yes a veteran) won a case where she was lied to about what services she could receive under her insurance contract”.
“This veteran proved successfully in court that the company was deceptive (hard to prove) and received $2 million to cover the over $4 million costs incurred when she was lied to years ago”.
- “And hold up, that’s not all of it. They are making this change retroactive, so she and others who won their court case has to pay it all back”.
The Last Of The Millenniums 
Reblogged this on TGM Millennials.
I skimmed through this bill to try to get an understanding of it greater than WTF, but that’s really all I’ve got. Basically, the bill takes away the private right of action for an individual to sue the insurance company, but it still recognizes that such practice is illegal. It just takes away the way to enforce it. (This is not be defending the bill in anyway, btw. Just me trying to understand it.)
This reminds me of how I get so frustrated when people talk about tort reform (generally without really knowing what that means). Tort reform often involves preventing people from getting to court, though the 7th Amendment guarantees our right to a trial when in a dispute over $20 or more (of course, the Constitution can’t be read in a vacuum). Yet at the same time, may of these people will also complain about regulation. Ok, so if the government isn’t regulating businesses, and we can’t sue to protect our rights individually, what are we supposed to do when we get hurt by someone else’s negligence or bad act? How are we supposed to know which businesses behave and which don’t play well with others? Looking through our history (at child labor, at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire), the answer is not the free market.
Great breakdown.
I read the bill too and came away with the same conclusion.
Capitalism can not be ‘free’ because it’s purpose is to make profit.
Add to that, capitalism has to pay the due (tax) for operating in a system that allows it to profit.
Legislation like this is simply shifting the burden onto the individual as it allows corporations to have greater security in making a profit.
In essence, corporations are becoming people….with greater protections then actual people.