A stake in New Orleans' heart?

Is the insurance industry going to kill New Orleans? The Dear Fancy Lady is still struggling to recover from her attempted drowning, and now the hospital door's being bolted shut in her face.

http://www.nola.com/news/t-p/frontpage/index.ssf?/base/news-7/1165042332198320.xml&coll=1&thispage=1

As if they didn't have enough trouble down there already getting people to come back, getting businesses reopened and the City's infrastructure repaired, the money grubbing insurance industry is pulling the rug out from beneath them. It never fails though, the insurance industry loves to collect those premiums but they're loathe to give any of it back in the form of claim adjustments. It's just not good for their bottom line, ya' know? :grr:
Fucking vultures. I hope the Feds step in and offer insurance or else the City will probably never recover. :cry:

insurance industry? (revving up my fax machine)

This may well sink us.

Insurance companies need to be regulated much more heavily. There must be rules to prevent insurance companies from pulling out.

Insurance companies must no longer be allowed to collect premiums only from low risk policy holders. It violates the very spirit and idea of insurance, which is to spread out the risk.

The insurance companies that are staying are simply RAPING the public. My car insurance (liability only) went from $38 per month to $180. No shit. Why is that? Liability doesn't expose the insurer to flood loss. They are just screwing EVERYONE here to get 'their' money back.

Additionally, the homeowner's insurance companies want to EXCLUDE WIND AND HAIL damage from their coverage !!!! WHAT THE FUCK is that? Does anyone think a bank will allow someone to insure a mortgaged home without wind and hail coverage?

Insurance should be nationalized for homeowners(as it is for flood). A gas tax should cover liability insurance.

Almost everyone in Florida has been raped by the insurance companies since 2004. We pay $1600 a year for auto insurance and now our homeowners insurance has gone up (about 4X what it originally was) to $3500 a year. And we could only get that because we raised our deductible for non-hurricane damage to $2500 and cut out all liability for dog bites. Our hurricane deductible went from $3100 to $3500.

God help you if LA allows insurance companies to do what they've done in FL (namely create "Florida only" insurance companies which then make TONS of money and fold as soon as the first hurricane hits. It's a great way to get rich, especially if you take people out of Citizens, because then the state will pay you to take these people and you can charge horrible rates, as well) THIS was Florida's solution to insurance companies pulling out of Florida.

Well, I originally wanted to post this in sympathy and it turned into a rant. Sorry about that! I do feel your pain, though!

The solutions are unclear at this point. We really just need to have state pool insurance and tax the living SHIT out of oil and gas exploration. Not like they can outsource that. The oil is here. That might encourage big oil to lobby on our behalf at the federal level to get some assistance in leveling the playing field.

As far as "return on investment" Louisiana is probably the richest state that has no money. From what I understand, Louisiana makes TONS of money on the Oil and Gas industries, which all goes straight into the Federal monies, but never comes back around to say... I don't know... rebuild South Louisiana, including fixing the levies and rebuilding the wetlands that could have blunted some of the damage from Katrina and Rita.

One of the things I was thinking Florida could do (they won't now that we got fucking Crist) was to tell insurance companies that they can't write ANY insurance in the entire state of Florida unless they are willing to write homeowners policies. Then do away with the "Florida only" companies and force them to actually insure us. Of course, that may backfire, but I don't think that insurance companies will really give up all the money they get from insuring cars and boats and pets and health and numerous other things just to not have homeowners insurance.

We also need to take some of the risk from insurers, so that they don't feel like they will lose so much in a hurricane. Encourage homeowners to rebuild with homes that are hurricane proof. Have a fund that takes over after insurers have paid out... say... a billion dollars. I don't know. Those are all ideas that need looking into, but they won't. We will continure to get screwed and eventually, people will have to leave because they can no longer afford to live here (our electric bill also doubled, and is almost $400 a month now. This was so FPL could get back the money they "lost" on the hurricanes)

If I live in an area with minimal risk of natural disasters, its generally a lower cost and less desirable area. Now you want me to subsidize those who want to live on or near the water or mountians with known higher risks of natural disaster or storm damage. How much more regressive can you get?

NO is a great place as is Florida, California, etc. However, like most Americans I can not afford to live there. Why should I subsidize those who choose to live there? There are arguably better off than most Americans.


On Edit : Spell check

got to be one of the most ignorant, deliberately ignorant, cruel and un-informed comments i have ever read on du: there arguably better off than most Americans.


who are you kidding, if you can't afford to live here, you must live in bangladesh or something, you can't afford to live anywhere in north america

anyone who puts new orleans housing market in the same sentence as florida and california does not know what they are talking about and people who do not know what they are talking about should stop talking

jeesus, the majority of people living in new orleans were the poorest of the poor, many of the homes destroyed were such things as sears kit houses from the teens and twenties in gentilly, yes, people were still living in them, or slum shotgun housing in the 9th ward, with the house basically worth nothing and full of dry rot and termites

if i knew this little about what i was talking about, i would be embarrassed to post on the subject except to ask questions, i would certainly not be making declarative statements

Everywhere has potential problems. Everywhere. I do not see that you are subsidizing anyone, how do you figure that? (Except perhaps subsidizing the companies that are making billions off the Iraq occupation every month)

Did you know that it is very easy to live very cheaply in NO? Did you know that there is a very high poverty level there (figuring income)? Yes, there are some very rich people living there, as most everywhere, but many many many people living there because friends, family, etc lived there and it was easy to live there (incomewise).

Perhaps you should do some more research if you really think that most americans could not afford to live in the Big Easy.

I had a problem with my flood insurance company. A letter to the Insurance Commissioner and I had a phone call and a new adjuster here within a week. Not all companies are attempting to pull out and take the rug with them. But the big ones - Travelers, Allstate, State Farm - like song said, "take the money and run."

Ironically, many insurance companies have re-insurance, which protects them from catastrophies. And although the insurance industry lost big in 2005 from Katrina, from what I've heard they made up their losses in one year from increased premiums.

Property and casualty insurance, like health insurance, requires regulation and actuarial accuracy. If the goal - spread the risk while making a reasonable (emphasis on that word, please) profit - were truly pursued, then, given the precision of actuarial and statistical analysis these days, rates and policies would be far different. Many companies will write policies on only "good" risks, living others to pay higher premiums, or go without insurance, and face costs - p&c, life, health, disability - that will make them paupers or deny them services.

BUT DON'T GIVE UP ON NEW ORLEANS YET!

AND GO SAINTS!

What happens if insurers start pulling out of coastal areas all over the country?

Now some companies will not renew or sell policies on property south of I-10.

for ALL insurance unless the companies make good on their claims. If Louisiana has to, they should set up a state fund for catastrophic damage.

Call the Bishop!

FEMA's Project Impact, started under the Clinton administration and killed during FEMA's conversion to an anti-bogeyman focus, was headed in the right direction. Its goal was disaster mitigation; it worked with communities in planning for potential disasters through such measures as retrofitting current buildings and appropriate rebuilding.

Project Impact: Building a Disaster Resistant Community
FEMA, Release date: November 22, 1999
http://www.fema.gov/news/newsrelease.fema?id=8895

I am amazed that this page is still on FEMA's web site. I guess it survived because it was an actual news release.

Destroying FEMA
Eric Holdeman, August 30, 2005
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/29/AR2005082901445_pf.html

Program Nixed in 2001 Could Have Curbed Gulf Coast Damage, Experts Say
Rebecca Claren, The New Standard, November 17, 2005.
http://newstandardnews.net/content/index.cfm/items/2601

do that somehow?

Part of the premise of the OP is that business cannot function in NOLA without insurance and without business, NOLA fails.
Yet you and others (#4) want to be rid of the insurance companies alltogether; exactly the opposite of what NOLA needs.
A necessary evil is still necessary.

decided to raise their rates on all coastal areas around the world due to global warming. they recognize that global is happening across this planet and unless something changes by the end of this century the coastal regions will be not habitable nor insurable. heck of a job george!

... any insurance company that made a profit insuring
anything in NOLA up until the time of Katrina should
be bound by law to continue providing insurance there.

So either the prices are in the stratosphere or they leave.

in the quarter after katrina allstate insurance posted its biggest quarterly profit ever

this is a matter of public record

the insurance companies are thieves, no two ways about it, this is extortion, because i think they are indeed planning for the time when they have to depart the insurance business because of global warming and they want to take the wealth of the nation with them when they go

it is not hurting their profits at all as yet, they are in fact breaking records

i suggest you look it up and inform yourself a little better

Aside from the obvious (ya know: doing the same thing over and over again, expecting a different outcome, that thing), it should be telling you that this company thinks it would lose money in the area regardless of how exorbitant the premium charged. They have looked at the plans for the area and found them so lacking that they would be better served by quiting. That an insurance company, the most usurious, morbid and just plain evil enterprise yet conceived, would abandon an area should have you screaming to the politicians. Screaming, not for retribution against the companies, but for protection from the projected risks.

I recall this:

>>
Saving New Orleans, a Sinking City
Morning Edition, September 8, 2005 · Katrina's damage to New Orleans is not surprising to geologists. The city was built on loose soil that compacts over time, causing it to sink every year, and the sea level is rising. Planners will have to consider this as they discuss how to rebuild the city.
>>
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4837031