Climate Disasters Prompt Another Home Insurance Company to Leave a State
Climate Disasters Prompt Another Home Insurance Company to Leave a State

Climate Disasters Prompt Another Home Insurance Company to Leave a State

Climate Disasters Prompt Another Home Insurance Company to Leave a State
Climate Disasters Prompt Another Home Insurance Company to Leave a State
Climate change is catching up. We've just had two mild summers after the worst two decades in wild fire history. We're in an El nino cycle that will likely sustain until maybe 26, 27? if it's comparable to the cycle we had in the mid 90s. We should see fewer fires but more fuel accumulation. Then we'll eventually enter into a la Nina phase, and experience the consequences of that period.
People like to throw the insurance companies under the bus here, and rightfully so, they're vile and should be apologized for. But what insurance companies are not is bad at math.
California's regulated market doesn't support the risk, and knowing mortgage rates, the average value of homes, and the limits on rate increases, the risk is increasing at a rate of at least 3% per year.
Because of this more and more people are ending up on the FAIR plan or the non admitted market. What many probably don't realize is that the risk pool associated with the highest risk customers is actually borne by the admitted marketplace.
We literally had to adjust the y axis on our graphs last year in Canada due to the wildfires.. We beat our old record.. By triple.
Repeat after me: "America is a first-world nation". Say that often enough and you might start to believe it!
And you base this on home insurance?
Do you think insurance companies are going to be willing to insure other people in other countries in climate disaster zones?
I don't think America is a shining city on a hill, but this is a global issue.
Mine was not a well-thought-out and prepared post, just an off-the-cuff comment that expressed my knee-jerk reaction.
To help break it down into its components:
A relevant article is https://www.politico.com/news/2024/01/12/trump-second-term-climate-science-2024-00132289, explaining how Trump believes that he was soft on the climate change issue before and now promises to go to war against "climate change". Oh wait no, my bad, the actual sentence is against "climate change scientists". He reiterates that it is fake, that it is caused by liberals (wait but didn't you just say that it was...?) with their "wind farms", and that one of the chief reasons that he even wants to become dictator for a day is so that he could then "drill, drill, drill". And since he is currently winning against his primary challengers, this is not merely some voice in the wilderness somewhere, but an actual forerunner of things yet to come, when people refuse to vote for Biden b/c of supporting Israel or b/c of the Hunter situation or whatever reason.
Insurance companies are simply reacting to the changes, but there are forces that are driving some of the things that we are seeing happening, in that even if a large portion of it is out of their control, they at least manage our response to those.
Indeed, other nations - actual first-world ones - are doing things to combat the changes that are occurring globally, rather than doubling down on the side of attempting to care yet still less than we already do.
Edit: and btw thank you 1000% percent for politely and respectfully asking what it was that I meant, rather than jumping full-bore to the most extreme and insane possibility that you could manage to think of and then use that strawman as a justification to attempt to ridicule me. I know that seems like a bare minimum to the likes of you and I, but in social media it sadly is of the most extreme rarity - like if this were a game's loot drop, then such a question would be beyond "uncommon", beyond even "rare", and outright "legendary":-).
Paywalled.
For those curious, the state is California.
The thumbnail image already made me think that was the one. :)