John McCain and Sarah Palin ran for office with a Cap and Trade plan in their platform. But, since 2008, the Republican Party, perhaps at the behest of the Koch Brothers, has decided to pretend that climate change is not occurring. I hadn’t really though about it, but it’s probably the inability to get insurance that will force the Republicans to give up this game.
Some of these events will occur in the near-enough term that local governments are under pressure to act. Insurance companies are applying pressure in high-risk areas, essentially saying adapt or pay higher premiums — especially in urban and commercial areas.
The reinsurance giant Swiss Re, for example, has said that if the shore communities of four Gulf Coast states choose not to implement adaptation strategies, they could see annual climate-change related damages jump 65 percent a year to $23 billion by 2030.
“Society needs to reduce its vulnerability to climate risks, and as long as they remain manageable, they remain insurable, which is our interest as well,” said Mark D. Way, head of Swiss Re’s sustainable development for the Americas.
Denying climate change might work politically for a couple of election cycles, but it won’t work economically.
I think I just got an infusion of hope.
I’ll wait and let the war between the insurance cos. and the Koch suckers play out a little before I get too excited.
Just remember that in the US, insurance companies and finance companies are the same animal.
After the last decade, empirical observation tells me that if we’re talking about politics that goes against financial companies in favor of other interests and politics that favor financial companies over other interests, I know which way I’m going to bet.
Well great, we’ll just let the ‘MARKET’ decide our fate. Remember those heady times in the very near past? It as good an arbiter as any. Very rational behavior on the part of insurance companies.
This was bound to happen at some point, as long as we have free market insurance. This is one of the only times that I feel good about having it, along with the last couple decades of automobile safety initiatives that were pushed by the free-market auto insurance industry.
In the long run, the KochWhores and friends really can’t win unless they are able to socialize insurance of ALL damages from ALL natural disasters. That would be a real stretch for their followers to support. Just think of the total mind-fuck PR campaign that they would need to fund in order to convince people that the government should insure storm and tornado damage… but not healthcare.
i think it’s much more likely that the koch brothers will fund the effort to fund a federal law barring the insurance industry from discriminating against low-lying coastal areas. it would probably sail right through. when you put it in terms of “discrimination” it might even be popular. in the end all it would mean is everyone’s rates would go up, even those in less high-risk areas. and so the great denial game would be allowed to continue.
Damages to rich communities will be paid through unfunded spending, which will be used as an excuse to cut spending on programs that benefit anyone making under $250,000/Yr…
Damages to poor communities will not be repaired, until getrification can occur funded by local tax levies on small businesses in poor neighborhoods, driving them out of business just in time for North Face and Apple retailers to move in.
Changes in state level premiums will be paid through increase in fees that hit lower end service users hardest as a percentage of yearly expenditures.
Did I miss anything?
Idiot capitalism–profit w/out any other considerations–will end. It will hit its limit. The question is whether it will be a political limit, the best option, or an environmental limit, the worst. Our political culture at this point rules out the first. I think what hope I have–because it’s a certainty this mess will end–is that the environmental issues begin to speed up the political process, e.g., people start to connect the real costs of high consumption with their daily lives and then realize that a political decision to reduce consumption is preferable to the environmental option. It’s a complex chain of thought, though, and complexity is not our political culture’s strong suit.
Booman Tribune ~ Comments ~ They Won’t Insure Stupid
yeah the dots may touch but still stay unconnected in the massmind.
two whole stages of causation to track, whoa nellie, i can feel the neurons fainting from the stress.
I always loved Peter Ustinov, and I love him more after seeing the quote in your sig.
Statistically speaking, property insurance companies don’t insure anyone who needs insurance. Try getting flood insurance living in a flood plain. Try getting earthquake insurance in Los Angeles. Only the big bad evil government dares to provide real help to those who actually need it. Insurance co’s, despite their touchy feely commercials, don’t give a crap about your home, life, boat, car, couch… they want your money. And they want to never give it back.
They rely on fear, uncertainty and doubt to jack up their own profit margin by freaking you out of your money. If “global warming” provides a plausible cover for rate hikes, they will become believers.
But since they are ALSO the ones with billions in taxpayer bailouts in their personal savings accounts, and politicians in their pockets, to believe that positive steps (read:taxpayer cash) will flow to mitigate climate change and thus will bring about lower insurance rates is a pipe dream.. It’s good to have dreams, but they are not in it to be a good neighbor. They are in it to take every last penny they can frighten out of your hands, and pay out as little as the law allows, sometimes less.
heh, nailed…
badder than the banksters!
this discussion reminds me of how chiropractic finally got recognised after years of being blocked in the courts by the AMA.
the shift happened when the insurance companies testified people went back to work faster than with conventional medicine.
guided back to the grindstone by the invisible hand, eh?