[mrkurt]

The health insurance industry is heavily regulated. Typically regulation begets more regulation, it's conceivable that they've limited insurance cos in such a way that the inducement restriction for brokers makes sense.

You definitely want insurance companies competing on price, but you may not want insurance brokers arbitrarily giving out rebates.

Imagine (and this is totally made up) that the insurance companies give brokers higher commissions at higher volumes; if that were the case, and brokers could give rebates, there are times a broker would push one insurance company's plan over another's simply to hit a sales incentive. That's probably not good for the people buying insurance. Part of the broker's job is to give good advice.