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Is the world becoming uninsurable?

(charleshughsmith.substack.com)
478 points spking | 5 comments | 17 Jan 25 00:32 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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tobyhinloopen ◴[17 Jan 25 07:13 UTC] No.42734903[source]▶
American, living in area prone to natural disasters: "Is the WHOLE WORLD becoming uninsurable?"

The answer is obviously "no" since there are other parts of the world that don't live on a hurricane highway nor build houses made from firewood in an area prone to wildfires.

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chillfox ◴[17 Jan 25 14:14 UTC] No.42737687[source]▶
It’s possible that solve the hurricane problems with proper building regulations and lower the risk of huge wildfires with controlled burning. But the US as always prefers to pretend that there’s nothing to be done when other parts of the world has figured it out.

We have cyclones here similar to the hurricanes in the US and usually it just blows over some trees maybe causes a power outage. The absolute worst I have experienced was 3 days without power. I have never seen a house destroyed by a cyclone here.

As for wildfires, they do unfortunately claim a few houses most years.

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pclmulqdq ◴[17 Jan 25 14:37 UTC] No.42737935[source]▶
As the governments in the US get increasingly incompetent, insurance prices are going to have to rise. Government services are largely there to protect you during black swan events, so if those services get less and less effective, you're going to need more insurance for those events.
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crawftv ◴[17 Jan 25 15:07 UTC] No.42738273[source]▶
This was the whole issue. California made it illegal for insurance companies to raise rates, so the insurance companies stop renewals. Leaving everybody uninsured. Homeowners couldn't buy insurance at any price.
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wrfrmers ◴[17 Jan 25 15:40 UTC] No.42738768[source]▶
Public insurance. For housing, healthcare, maybe even cars (since the coprorate political complex insists that we HAVE to drive everywhere). At some point, we have to accept that the middlemen are siphoning value, not providing any. Vanguard it and let elected admins set the codes.
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1. ben_w ◴[17 Jan 25 16:08 UTC] No.42739337{3}[source]▶
As a British citizen by birth, I'm amused by the idea that Americans may get National Insurance for houses before they do for healthcare.
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2. pclmulqdq ◴[17 Jan 25 17:07 UTC] No.42740457[source]▶
It does seem to be backward. In my opinion, "insurance" is strictly about compensation for loss, and should absolutely be a private transaction, while preventative and emergency systems should probably be public. Healthcare coverage, despite being called "insurance," is really a system of preventative and emergency services, while California's state-run home insurance is the former. But this is what they get for trying to have price controls.
3. Alive-in-2025 ◴[17 Jan 25 17:13 UTC] No.42740573[source]▶
That's a great point. We'll get public insurance for houses only if the legalized bribery paid by existing insurance companies to block public ins. is less effectively applied than the money blocking public health insurance in the US. Old people don't care because they have medicare at 65+, while the rest of us slubs are going along with whatever we can find.

We get what we allow or deserve here in the US. Citizens United led to our current awful outcome.

4. rs999gti ◴[17 Jan 25 18:30 UTC] No.42741676[source]▶
> but if you have a house to insure you're worth protecting.

American home owners pay property taxes, any politician would not want to kill this income source off.

5. kube-system ◴[17 Jan 25 20:18 UTC] No.42742825[source]▶
We have plenty of national insurance programs, including for both of those... but they're not both free and universal.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Flood_Insurance_Progr...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medicare_(United_States)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medicaid