Homeowners insurance premiums went up 19 percent on average nationwide, according to a report from an online insurance provider.

Homeinsurance.com, as reported in the Insurance Journal, said the typical premium for a new policy in December 2011 was $810 nationwide, up from $682 in January 2011.

The company said its quarterly RateReport data represents approximately 15,000 policies sold across the United States with various carriers including Travelers, Safeco, The Hartford, and ASI/Ark Royal.

RateReport shows that on a nationwide basis, homeowners are paying, on average, $128 more per year for new home insurance than they were at the beginning of the year.

Premium increases were more dramatic in some states than others, including Mississippi, Montana and New Mexico where new policies in December 2011 were seeing 29-39 percent higher premiums than those sold in January 2011. The increases make sens in Mississppi which saw devastating tornados in 2011. Why are rates up so dramatically in Montana and New Mexico? Readers.... any thoughts?

There were also spots with lower rates towards the end of 2011 including Washington D.C., where homeowners were paying about 7 percent less for new policies. Also new policies sold in December 2011 in Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia and California decreased in price as compared to earlier in the year when they were 1 to 3 percent higher.

In a related note there's also news that Congress may extend the NFIP for one month to the end of June while they work out a long-term fix.

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A new report on health care costs for the typical family of four are projected to reach $20,728 this year, a 6.9% increase from last year, according to the Milliman Medical Index as reported by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

In an earlier post today here I cited the opinion of Howard Dean that health care costs should have been a higher priority under ObamaCare than the individual mandate.

The index tracks the average health care costs for a typical American family of four insured through the most common health plan offered by employers.

The 6.9% increase projected for this year is the lowest in the 10 years of this study, according to Milliman, an actuarial and consulting firm with an office in Milwaukee. At the same time, the total dollar increase is the largest in that time period.

The Consumer Price Index, which measures inflation at the consumer level, increased 2.3% over the last 12 months, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Tuesday.

"This helps illustrate the challenge of controlling health care costs," Lorraine Mayne, a Milliman principal and consulting actuary, said in a news release. "When the total cost is already so high, even slower rate of growth has a serious impact on family budgets."

Former New Hampshire Gov. Howard Dean recently told a crowd of brokers--who had slammed the former presidential candidate's position on health care--that the individual mandate provision is "one of the very large blunders" of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and predicted the Supreme Court will rule it unconstitutional.

"It was never necessary in the president's bill; they should have never put it in," Dean told attendees at the Benefits Selling Expo in San Antonio, Texas.

But he's unsure what will happen because court lawyers made a brilliant case trying to convince the justices that without the mandate, the bill will fall apart.

Still, Dean said he expects the rest of the bill will remain intact as the court will be "very reluctant" to get rid of all of it.

Despite Dean's history of support of universal health care, he said he wasn't "a terribly big supporter of the president's health reform bill. But we have what we have." His lack of support for the PPACA is due to a lack of cost control in the bill.

The entire incentive in this system is to spend as much as you possibly can, and that's why health care cannot continue as it is. The solution? Pay by the patient and not by the procedure, Dean said.

Issues of whether business' cyber liability risks should be regulated and privacy protection are standing in the way of needed federal cyber security and privacy legislation, experts say.

Currently, several bills with varying approaches are pending legislative action, according to Business Insurance.

Back in April, the U.S. House voted to approve the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA), which would help the private sector "defend itself from advanced cyber threats without imposing any new federal regulations or unfunded private sector mandates". However, the Senate has thus far failed to act.

The CISPA bill attempts to regulate the fast-moving electronic data industry. House Intelligence Chairman Mike Rogers, CISPA's author, says it will not endanger Americans' privacy.

Passions have flared on both sides as the Senate debates the bill. CISPA would "waive every single privacy law ever enacted in the name of cybersecurity," says opponent Rep. Jared Polis, a Colorado Democrat and onetime Web entrepreneur, said during the debate. "Allowing the military and NSA to spy on Americans on American soil goes against every principle this country was founded on."

Based on those passionate opinions, compromise may be difficult to reach and ultimately cyber security may suffer.