Document NEaRwaXeB54NL1NdQmwNOROYD

8--Workmen's Compensation Insurance employee need not be completely helpless nor unable to earn a single dollar at a job His limitations need only prevent him from com peting in a practical way in the open job market and are such that no stable job market exists for him The exclusive remedy doctrine and third party liability Before workmen's compensation laws were enacted in the states, an employee, m order to recover damages for a work-connected in jury, always was required to show some de gree of fault on the part of his employer Un der what is now known as the "quid pro quo of workmen's compensation law," employers accepted, or were required to accept, re sponsibility for injuries arising out of and in the course of employment without regard to fault In exchange, employees gave up the right to sue employers for unlimited damages These agreements are usually referred to in the state acts as "exclusive remedy" provi sions, a term that is quite misleading In no state are workmen's compensation benefits necessarily the only remedy available to an injured worker Depending upon the working of the applicable statute, the worker may bring a negligence action against a fellow worker, another contractor on the same job, or some other entity or individual who caused the compensable injury From the employer's viewpoint, it is best to refer to the doctrine as the "exclusive liability rule " As the em ployee sees the rule, it remains an "exclusive remedy" for obtaining compensation from the employer But neither Lability nor remedy are perfectly exclusive Private Insurer Programs Pnvate insurers dominate the coverage The ten leading groups wrote almost half the business, the top twenty about 68 percent, up from 62 percent m 1950, although the share of the top ten has changed little The ten leaders wrote as much as 88 percent of the coverage in Hawau to as little as 51 percent m Kansas and Nebraska In four states, one insurer wrote one-fourth of the business Only 36 of the 383 insurers earned work men's compensation premiums of $20 million or more, but these 36 cornered more than 78 percent of the total Companies with nation wide operabons accounted for 83 percent Insurers licensed m only one state, more than 20 percent of all insurance companies, wrote less than 4 percent of the premiums. Workmen's compensabon is the second largest property-liability insurance line, it is topped only by automobile insurance Work men's compensabon premiums are about II percent of the total premium income Among the ten leading pnvate insurance groups, four denve at least one-third of their business from workmen's compensabon Classifications ot Insurers Private insurers can be classified according to their legal form of orgamzabon, their mar keting methods, and their pncing policies Legally, insurers may be classified as propnetary or cooperabve insurers Propnetary insurers have owners who bear the risks of the insurer and whose representabves manage the operabons The leading example by far is the stock insurer owned by stockholders who elect the board of directors In 1970 of the 383 pnvate groups in workmen's compen sabon insurance, about 68 percent were stock companies, with about 70 percent of the total premium volume Cooperabve insurers have no owners other than their policyholders The leading exam ple is the advance premium mutual whose board of directors is elected by those policyholders who exercise their nght to vote Unlike stock insurers, these insurers have no capital stock Instead retamed earnings serve as a cushion against adverse expenence In 1970, mutual insurers, about 32 percent of the pnvate workmen's compensabon insurers, wrote 30 percent of the premiums earned Almost all of the 1970 workmen's compen sation insurance premiums not wntten by stock or mutual insurers were wntten by re ciprocal exchanges which, m their modem form, closely resemble advance premium mu tuals The relabve importance of stocks, mutuals, and reciprocal exchanges vanes among states In several states, stock insurers write over 75 percent of the business In a few states, mu tual insurers dominate the private insurance field Since 1951, when their share was 59 per- 192