What Do Socialism and Capitalism Mean to You

[Bomb#20]

Medical insurance is her field. Medical insurance is a whole separate universe from normal insurance.

No, it's not. It's a separate practice area.

Are there other losses insurance pays for besides medical care for which it's also illegal for policies to exclude preexisting conditions from coverage?

And it's health insurance, not medical insurance. The distinction is probably not particularly meaningful to you, but it is a distinction.

Sorry to get the terminology wrong then -- I'm no industry guru. Is the distinction that there are policies that pay off in the event of ill health regardless of whether that ill health leads the insured to run up medical bills?

 

[laughing dog]

There are some possible explanations over my (or others) declination to engage in pedagogical discussion over flood insurance with you:
1) I (or we) don't know the answer,
2) I (or we) don't think you are willing to engage in a honest discussion,
3) I (or we) don't think you are capable of grasping the necessary concepts,
4) other possibilities I cannot think of at this moment.

Notice 2 and 3 are based solely on my (or our) expectations based on experience, personality and biases -...

No, 2 and 3 may well be based on your personality and biases, but those expectations are not based on anything whatsoever in your experience.

While you may disagree with my perceptions, you cannot possibly know what they truly are.

For you to claim they are is a false damaging claim made with malice and reckless disregard for the truth. Stop behaving that way.

I offered them as alternative rationales to your false, damaging malicious claim made (that you have repeated). Whether you like it or not, every poster (including you) are entitled to their perceptions and conclusions, and to post them subject to the rules of this forum.

 

[Bomb#20]

I do have a masters in applied mathematics in addition to being an accredited actuarial fellow.

Excellent. Then let us reason together, one logician to another.

Either way, it's not about pulling rank - it's about the fact that this is a bit more complicated than you probably realize,

I'm sure it is. But when someone offers a simple explanation that's illogical, and someone else points out the logic error, the reply "It's a bit more complicated" is perfectly consistent with the hypothesis that there exists a more complicated explanation for the same concusion that's logical, but it doesn't make the logic error in the original simple explanation go away.

and that a layperson's armchair interpretation isn't exactly a solid argument. No matter how smart and skilled you are (and I always enjoy reading your arguments even when I disagree), it's probably not a great idea for a layperson to take on a quantum physicist and tell the physicist that they're wrong about their own field's jargon based on what they read in Scientific American.

What actuarial jargon do you perceive me to be telling you and AA you're wrong about? "Capitalism" is not actuarial jargon. "Explanation" is not actuarial jargon. "Uninsurable risk" is actuarial jargon, but the definition I posted and relied on -- "An uninsurable risk is a risk that insurance companies cannot insure (or are reluctant to insure) no matter how much you pay." -- is from the insurance industry professionals at Insuranceopedia. If that's wrong and it's really a bit more complicated than that, feel free to tell me the correct definition and then we can examine it together and check whether correcting the definition patches up the logic holes in AA's explanations.

Life insurance does not use the same approach, and your argument here is entirely wrong. When it comes to life insurance, death is an inevitability - but WHEN is uncertain.

When it comes to flood insurance, flooding is an inevitability - but WHEN is uncertain. Your explanation is illogical.

Flooding is not an inevitability. It might be an inevitability if you live in a flood plain... but certainly not for someone living on a high plateau in Nevada.

The premise that flooding is an inevitability didn't come from me; I got it straight out of the explanation AA directed me to. "Since they were sure to be flooded,". So if that premise is wrong, that's game, set and match -- the explanation AA offered is wrong, full stop. And you're the person who refuted it.

But in this case I think we are all focusing primarily about insuring people who live in flood plains, so let's take it as read that any inapplicability of our comments to a high plateau in Nevada needn't concern us. Since you're stipulating that it might be an inevitability if you live in a flood plain, you haven't made any case for my argument here being entirely wrong -- or at all wrong. You have not exhibited any difference between flood and death that could make

X insurance could not be a profitable venture because the only people who would want X coverage would be those who Y. Since they were sure to be Xed, the rates would be too high to attract customers​

a logical explanation when X = one but not a logical explanation when X = the other.

Have you looked into Chubb's offerings? Do they offer them everywhere? Are there areas where they are not available? Are there limitations on the type of flood covered - does it cover rising groundwater, broken plumbing, oceanic swell, flash flood, or are some of those excluded?

I haven't looked into them in detail, but I'm sure there are bound to be areas where they are not available and there may well be limitations on the type of flood. But the policies are available in the sorts of floodplains NFIP covers and for the types of flood NFIP covers -- their main line of flood product appears to be policies that will pay for damage in excess of the NFIP $250,000 maximum payout.

In any event, there were no dependencies on which floodplains and which flood types in AA's explanations. So if the truth about uninsurability of flood damage turns on those details, that itself implies AA's explanations were incorrect.

 

[Bomb#20]

...what did I say that you think is wrong that you think your training and exams made you an authority on?

[crickets]*

There is a difference between argument from authority and argument from qualified expertise. Quoting ever so many creationist pseudo-scientists as authorities does make one right about evolution being false, for example.

Well then, what did I say that you think is wrong that you think Emily's training and exams gave her qualified expertise on? It's not like I claimed my earthquake insurance is overpriced.

(* Emily replied extensively to the post in which the above question appeared, but she did not address that particular question. )

 

[Bomb#20]

Let's pick that apart. You're implying the same underlying cause -- that flood insurance is intrinsically unprofitable -- explains both. That's a beautiful theory. Beautiful theory, meet ugly fact. Flood insurance can be profitable. You ridiculing me for not accepting an argument from authority doesn't magically cause Chubb and the other companies to stop selling the non-NFIP flood insurance they sell.

Now then, let's turn to the explanation in your link.

"During the 1920s, the insurance industry concluded that flood​

insurance could not be a profitable venture because the only people who would​

want flood coverage would be those who lived in floodplains.​

Since they were sure to be flooded, the rates would be too high to attract customers."​

Likewise, the only people who would want death coverage would be those who are mortal. Since they are sure to die, the rates would be too high to attract customers. Therefore the insurance industry concluded that life insurance could not be a profitable venture. Oh, wait. I don't think I'm any kind of insurance industry guru and even I can figure out life insurance is a thing.

Those are completely different types of insurance. Life insurance is predicting the timing of the event so the insurer can earn enough interest to cover the benefit. Property insurance has typically a 1 year time limit and event frequency is the number one contributor to catastrophic property coverage (severity being the second). This is why all floods, hurricanes, earthquakes, etc. are referred to by their return periods (1 in 100 year, 1 in 10 year, etc.)

I don't think I'm any kind of insurance industry guru and even I can figure out term life insurance is a thing. Deaths of young men within the term of a ten-year term life policy have event frequencies too.

There are no doubt any number of differences between life insurance and property insurance you can point to if you intend to special-plead, but you have not pointed out any differences between them that make "Since they were sure to [be flooded/die], the rates would be too high to attract customers." applicable to flood but not to death. If in fact there are differences between flood and death that make flood uninsurable and death insurable, then a correct explanation for why flood is uninsurable will have to reference at least one of those differences. Whatever those differences may be, since the explanation at your link did not reference them, that explanation is not correct. This is a matter of logic, not a matter of insurance industry guruhood.

And yes, surprisingly, data analytics have gotten much better in the last 100 years. Insurers now have more refined flood maps than the FEMA flood plain maps developed in 1960. They can offer endorsements and gap coverages at better rates than NFIP.

Well, when I asked you what made flood uninsurable, if you'd told me pricing flood policies is a difficult technical problem that 1920s-1960s-era data analytics methods were not yet up to the challenge of, that would have been a reasonable explanation and our discussion wouldn't have gone south.

And please believe we are not engaged in an 'argument' right now. I'm telling you what I know from firsthand experience. The thing that chapped your ass to begin with was that I said insurance isn't very capitalist. It is quite literally sharing and paying for risk across a community.

And you know from firsthand experience that the criterion for "capitalism" is "No sharing and paying for risk across a community", do you? Was "Define capitalism." one of the questions on your ACAS exams?

The state approves what you are allowed to charge, so if you can't get rate for flood, you don't cover it (and the government ends up with a new 'program').

The thing that chapped my ass in the first place was that you offered the circumstance that insurance as currently practiced in the US isn't very capitalist because it is a completely government controlled market as a counterargument to my contention that capitalism is spectacularly well fitted for fire insurance. It should be blindingly obvious that the government can completely control any market it pleases whether capitalism is good at it or not. Your counterargument therefore was very poor; and worse, your counterargument misrepresented my position as "to call a completely government controlled market a good example of capitalism." I called it nothing of the sort.

The thing that chapped my ass subsequently was that I asked you to share your expertise and provide an explanation for a counterintuitive phenomenon, and what I received from you was an explanation that as a matter of logic could not possibly be correct, immediately followed by an unprovoked insult. So you're right about one thing: we are not engaged in an 'argument' right now. Apparently that was the point where I walked into the abuse clinic instead of the argument clinic.

 

[Emily Lake]

Medical insurance is her field. Medical insurance is a whole separate universe from normal insurance.

No, it's not. It's a separate practice area.

Are there other losses insurance pays for besides medical care for which it's also illegal for policies to exclude preexisting conditions from coverage?

Yes. Lots of property insurance policies exclude pre-existing damages from coverage.

And it's health insurance, not medical insurance. The distinction is probably not particularly meaningful to you, but it is a distinction.

Sorry to get the terminology wrong then -- I'm no industry guru. Is the distinction that there are policies that pay off in the event of ill health regardless of whether that ill health leads the insured to run up medical bills?

There are other types of policies which cover specific types of medical situations, but are not comprehensive health coverages. Critical illness for example, often covers specific risks related to cancer and similar, but it's not a Health practice policy, it's a Life policy. Don't ask me why, I didn't make the rules. Suffice to say that Critical Illness policies are not regulated as Health Insurance, they're regulated under the auspices of Life Insurance.

The distinction speaks to what licensing, requirements, and regulations apply.

 

[Emily Lake]

Honestly, Bomb... This is a situation where both AA and I could spend pages and pages of extremely long-winded posts trying to explain some of this stuff. But it's going to end up being a case where we have to pull apart all of the various assumptions you've made - both implicitly and explicitly, as well as the specific terminology, and the various possible interpretations of that terminology and how it differs from context to context. It's a whole lot of effort to convince you that your layperson's interpretation is not actually correct or sufficient.

And I'm sorry, but it's just not worth the effort involved.

I'll attempt to provide one bit of context here.

A risk can be considered uninsurable in general, but still have some specific insured instances. This is more common in property and casualty than in practice areas on the Life side, but we still get them too. For example, in a general sense, "healthy legs" are uninsurable. The list of things that could go wrong for the average person is enormous, and there's no reasonable way to estimate leg morbidity. But in some cases, celebrities can still insure their legs. For those few whose legs are the source of their income, they can pay a fairly high premium to property and casualty companies for bespoke policies that provide income insurance based on a specific attribute. But it's a special circumstance, and the premiums tend to be quite high.

The same is true for Flood Insurance - it is generally considered uninsurable on the whole. Largely because of how federal funds play into it, but also because the adverse selection is enormous. People living on mountaintops where it rarely rains could probably afford it, but don't see any good reason to pay anything at all since the risk is so incredibly low; people in flood plains really really want coverage but they're not going to be able to afford the premiums needed to cover the risk. You referenced Chubb covering Flood, sure. And they are targeting high-end consumers with enough disposable income that the high premium is not a barrier. This is fairly close to being bespoke coverage.

At the end of the day, high-end specialty insurers can insure anything at all - provided their customer is willing to pay enough. That doesn't change the fact that many of the things they insure are considered "uninsurable" on principle, because it's not feasible to provide general coverage for a community-pooled risk in a way that is sustainable and can be reserved for in a rational fashion.

If that doesn't suffice for you, well, that's all I'm willing to get into here. I just don't have the motivation to argue every other word with you and spend 10 pages teaching you my field and alleviating your misunderstandings. It's not worth the effort. That's not to say that I discount you as a person in any way. It's just that the amount of effort involved on may part would cover several years worth of exam material and I don't want to be a teacher. There's no joy or fun in it for me, just a lot of headaches.

 

[Toni]

entitlements like SS,

I liked the post above, but wish people weren’t conditioned to call SS an “entitlement“. One is only “entitled” to what they have paid in to the SS system, and sometimes not even that. Mrs Elixir, for instance, paid FICA for a few years but came up a quarter short of being able to collect.
The fact that even a lib’rul like SH is habituated to calling it an entitlement is a testament to the effectiveness of right wing propaganda.

Nope. I call it an entitlement because I paid into it for almost 50 years, therefore I am entitled to the benefit. I've never understood why so many people are bothered by the word, entitlement.

Social Security in the US is defined as an entitlement system. It requires contributions during your (or your spouse's) working life in order to qualify for benefits, but once that requirement is met, all people are ENTITLED to an allotment. And that allotment is not proportional to what was contributed. If someone earns more and contributes the maximum that SS takes out of your paycheck, you don't get any more in benefits than someone who contributed the bare minimum. The fact that it is an entitlement system is part of why there's a maximum contribution in the first place.

Social Security is not a pension, nor is it retirement insurance. It's not structured like either of those at all, and it doesn't follow the same rules.

The amount of social security benefits one collects IS proportional —to a point. There is a minimum one can receive of, for some reason you did not have a long or lucrative earning history. There is a maximum benefit as well.

What you seem to have forgotten is that for high wage earners, one only pays SS tax on a portion of your earnings— I think it maxed out at around $80K/year with earnings over that not subject to SS contributions.

A common misunderstanding g in the US is that your specific contributions go into a specific account for you only. In fact, SS has always depended ( in part) on contributions of younger workers paying for the benefits retired workers are paid. For example, you may have mad a contribution of $100K over your lifetime but your benefits may well exceed that amount if you live long enough. SS is also built on the assumption that most people die within so many. ( don’t remember the exact number) years of their retirement.

 

[Bomb#20]

Capitalism: PVP economics.
Socialism: PVE economics.

The question is whether or not you wish to view other people as "players" or "environment".

PVP: Player vs Player
PVE: Player vs Environment.

My thought is that the environment is evil enough without the players adding more to that.

Alice: I invented widgets.​

Bob: I want to buy a widget.​

Cindy: I want to manufacture widgets.​

Dave: I want to invest my savings in Cindy's widget factory.​

Edna: Investment in manufacturing isn't up to Dave; it's up to the central planners.​

Frank: There are no resources allocated to widgets in the central plan.​

Gwen: Let's add widgets to the central plan.​

Harry: That would mean reducing resources for other things. I vote against widgets.​

Frank: I agree with Harry. Sorry Gwen, you're outvoted.​

Edna: Sorry Cindy. The central planners turned you down. You can't build a widget factory.​

Cindy: Sorry Bob. I can't sell you a widget.​

On what planet is socialism not PVP economics?

So, not being able to PVP is being PVP in your books because you want to PVP, the other player wants to PVE, and that makes you a P vs the other P. Got it.

So, the socialist central planners are PVE, not PVP, because the socialist central planners are PVE, not PVP -- and you define that to be the case notwithstanding however many other Ps the socialist central planner Ps are V. Got it. You are making a circular argument.

It all reduces right back to "WAHH, Why can't I place myself against the other players!!!111"

You don't mind the central planners placing themselves against the other players; you just won't admit they're doing it because that would spoil your fairy tale. Besides which, you haven't bothered to show how Bob, Cindy and Dave all cooperating to bring widgets into the world qualifies as placing themselves against the other players.

The minute you are talking "my savings" and "invest" you are already in PVP land, and capitalism.

There were savings in Mao's China, and in the USSR -- people infamously saved up their meager pay for ten years to buy a Lada. What socialist rulers ever tried to make societies without savings apart from the Khmer Rouge? Are there no savings in your fantasy socialist utopia? How does that work? Do you mean there's no money, no choosing which products to buy, you just get whatever the to-each-according-to-his-needs commissaries decide you need whether they know what you like or not? Or do you mean you have no savings because if you choose not to spend as much as you were paid they deduce you need less than they thought and reduce your pay correspondingly?

Your example of Socialism as PVP assumes capitalist PVPing right at the start of it.

No it doesn't. Nobody is capitalist PVPing in my scenario -- the central planners coercively prevented them from doing so. My example assumes there are people who want to capitalist PVP, if that's what you're referring to. But that's a nothing-burger of an assumption, on a level with assuming that even Soviet Man will still want music, sex and cookies.

But even if we set that aside, and fantasize about some counterfactual alternate universe in which Soviet Man will be some alien species with no interest in acting capitalistically, the notion that socialism isn't PVP is beyond ludicrous. "When people have to obey other people's orders, equality's out of the question." When no one is competing for money because the central planners decide what everyone needs and everyone works cooperatively for the common goal of meeting those needs, people will compete PVP for membership in the central planning committee, and then the central planners will enforce their decisions PVP on everyone who thinks he knows better. PVP is not caused by capitalism. PVP is caused by the existence of mutually exclusive uses for resources. That's a constraint all economic systems must face. You called PVP evil. PVP is not evil. Ought implies can.

 

[Bomb#20]

Medical insurance is her field. Medical insurance is a whole separate universe from normal insurance.

No, it's not. It's a separate practice area.

Are there other losses insurance pays for besides medical care for which it's also illegal for policies to exclude preexisting conditions from coverage?

Yes. Lots of property insurance policies exclude pre-existing damages from coverage.

That's not what I asked.

Per Wikipedia, the ACA made it illegal for health insurance policies to exclude pre-existing conditions from coverage. "Insurers were made to accept all applicants without charging based on preexisting conditions...". This changes the character of the economic relationship between insurer and insured. Pre-ACA, health insurance was a voluntary arrangement that benefited both parties due to the parties' different tolerance for risk. But now if a person chooses not to buy insurance until after he gets sick he can compel an insurance company to pay large proceeds in return for a small premium with 100% certainty, since he already knows what medical care he's going to need. So the relationship is no longer about hedging risk, it's no longer voluntary, and it's no longer mutually beneficial.

My question was, is there any similar law in property insurance, or life insurance, or liability insurance, or any practice area other than health insurance? If I die, can my wife then go to some insurance company we had no prior relationship with and make them sell her a life insurance policy on me and immediately collect the full coverage amount, on account of my being already dead?

 

[Emily Lake]

Medical insurance is her field. Medical insurance is a whole separate universe from normal insurance.

No, it's not. It's a separate practice area.

Are there other losses insurance pays for besides medical care for which it's also illegal for policies to exclude preexisting conditions from coverage?

Yes. Lots of property insurance policies exclude pre-existing damages from coverage.

That's not what I asked.

Per Wikipedia, the ACA made it illegal for health insurance policies to exclude pre-existing conditions from coverage. "Insurers were made to accept all applicants without charging based on preexisting conditions...". This changes the character of the economic relationship between insurer and insured. Pre-ACA, health insurance was a voluntary arrangement that benefited both parties due to the parties' different tolerance for risk. But now if a person chooses not to buy insurance until after he gets sick he can compel an insurance company to pay large proceeds in return for a small premium with 100% certainty, since he already knows what medical care he's going to need. So the relationship is no longer about hedging risk, it's no longer voluntary, and it's no longer mutually beneficial.

My question was, is there any similar law in property insurance, or life insurance, or liability insurance, or any practice area other than health insurance? If I die, can my wife then go to some insurance company we had no prior relationship with and make them sell her a life insurance policy on me and immediately collect the full coverage amount, on account of my being already dead?

I misread.

There are some limitations on insurance in other contexts. It's hard to definitively answer that question. If nothing else "pre-existing condition" becomes a very broad term when taken outside of the context of medical conditions.

For consideration... Group Term Life doesn't underwrite for base coverage. In some places, auto insurers aren't allowed to distinguish between male and female drivers, even though there are statistically material differences in the likelihood of an accident by sex.

In regards to ACA... I'm not sure that Individual coverage through the ACA market actually constitutes "insurance" anymore. The requirement for comprehensive coverage including routine and preventive care, as well as the elimination of underwriting and risk-based rating, as well as the introduction of substantial subsidies, pretty much makes it a prepaid service agreement, rather than a true insurance product.

 

[Bomb#20]

That's not what I asked.

Per Wikipedia, the ACA made it illegal for health insurance policies to exclude pre-existing conditions from coverage. "Insurers were made to accept all applicants without charging based on preexisting conditions...". This changes the character of the economic relationship between insurer and insured. Pre-ACA, health insurance was a voluntary arrangement that benefited both parties due to the parties' different tolerance for risk. But now if a person chooses not to buy insurance until after he gets sick he can compel an insurance company to pay large proceeds in return for a small premium with 100% certainty, since he already knows what medical care he's going to need. So the relationship is no longer about hedging risk, it's no longer voluntary, and it's no longer mutually beneficial.

My question was, is there any similar law in property insurance, or life insurance, or liability insurance, or any practice area other than health insurance? If I die, can my wife then go to some insurance company we had no prior relationship with and make them sell her a life insurance policy on me and immediately collect the full coverage amount, on account of my being already dead?

I misread.

There are some limitations on insurance in other contexts. It's hard to definitively answer that question. If nothing else "pre-existing condition" becomes a very broad term when taken outside of the context of medical conditions.

For consideration... Group Term Life doesn't underwrite for base coverage.

Is it illegal to underwrite for base coverage? Not being an industry guru, I assumed the insurance companies had simply measured how much adverse selection on group term life policies was costing them and found it to be less than the cost of doing medical exams on everybody in the covered groups. Is it actually a government mandate?

In some places, auto insurers aren't allowed to distinguish between male and female drivers, even though there are statistically material differences in the likelihood of an accident by sex.

Microeconomics suggests insurers would love that regulation -- it would let them get away with charging women higher premiums than otherwise. Pure profit. In a normal market, a company that tried this would lose women's business to some competitor who priced its policies based on sex-dependent accident likelihood -- unless there were some reason the competitors weren't going to undercut it. If all the companies stopped considering sex together and raised all their profits, by colluding, that would be an antitrust violation. But if all the companies stop considering sex together and raise all their profits because the government is ordering them to, sweet!

In regards to ACA... I'm not sure that Individual coverage through the ACA market actually constitutes "insurance" anymore. The requirement for comprehensive coverage including routine and preventive care, as well as the elimination of underwriting and risk-based rating, as well as the introduction of substantial subsidies, pretty much makes it a prepaid service agreement, rather than a true insurance product.

Quite so. It's because of considerations like this that I called health insurance a separate universe. The companies appear to be not so much hedging risk like traditional insurance, but more carrying out their government-assigned roles in America's convoluted socialized-medicine system.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

In some places, auto insurers aren't allowed to distinguish between male and female drivers, even though there are statistically material differences in the likelihood of an accident by sex.

Microeconomics suggests insurers would love that regulation -- it would let them get away with charging women higher premiums than otherwise. Pure profit. In a normal market, a company that tried this would lose women's business to some competitor who priced its policies based on sex-dependent accident likelihood -- unless there were some reason the competitors weren't going to undercut it. If all the companies stopped considering sex together and raised all their profits, by colluding, that would be an antitrust violation. But if all the companies stop considering sex together and raise all their profits because the government is ordering them to, sweet!

Nope--insurance companies have to get state approval for rates for the commonly-required types of insurance. They're not going to get it if they jack the price up too much. (What we actually see is the opposite--regulators trying to hold rates down to the point insurance companies tell them where to stick it and leave the state entirely.)

In regards to ACA... I'm not sure that Individual coverage through the ACA market actually constitutes "insurance" anymore. The requirement for comprehensive coverage including routine and preventive care, as well as the elimination of underwriting and risk-based rating, as well as the introduction of substantial subsidies, pretty much makes it a prepaid service agreement, rather than a true insurance product.

Quite so. It's because of considerations like this that I called health insurance a separate universe. The companies appear to be not so much hedging risk like traditional insurance, but more carrying out their government-assigned roles in America's convoluted socialized-medicine system.

From the standpoint of the consumer it's still insurance. From a marketplace perspective it is not.

 

[Bomb#20]

In some places, auto insurers aren't allowed to distinguish between male and female drivers, even though there are statistically material differences in the likelihood of an accident by sex.

Microeconomics suggests insurers would love that regulation -- it would let them get away with charging women higher premiums than otherwise. Pure profit. In a normal market, a company that tried this would lose women's business to some competitor who priced its policies based on sex-dependent accident likelihood -- unless there were some reason the competitors weren't going to undercut it. If all the companies stopped considering sex together and raised all their profits, by colluding, that would be an antitrust violation. But if all the companies stop considering sex together and raise all their profits because the government is ordering them to, sweet!

Nope--insurance companies have to get state approval for rates for the commonly-required types of insurance. They're not going to get it if they jack the price up too much. (What we actually see is the opposite--regulators trying to hold rates down to the point insurance companies tell them where to stick it and leave the state entirely.)

That sounds less like a "Nope--' than like a "Yep, but also--". Regulations typically take the form "You must X, and your competitors must also X." Some regulations such as price caps are a net harm to every firm, true; but other regulations can be a net help to your firm because their restrictions on your competitors indirectly help you more than those regulations directly hurt you by restricting you. Regulatory agencies go in for both kinds.

Or are you saying the same states that banned sex-dependent premiums ordered insurers to lower men's premiums to match women's but also prohibited them from compensating for that by raising women's premiums? That sounds like it would be a good way to get insurance companies to tell them where to stick it and leave the state entirely.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

In some places, auto insurers aren't allowed to distinguish between male and female drivers, even though there are statistically material differences in the likelihood of an accident by sex.

Microeconomics suggests insurers would love that regulation -- it would let them get away with charging women higher premiums than otherwise. Pure profit. In a normal market, a company that tried this would lose women's business to some competitor who priced its policies based on sex-dependent accident likelihood -- unless there were some reason the competitors weren't going to undercut it. If all the companies stopped considering sex together and raised all their profits, by colluding, that would be an antitrust violation. But if all the companies stop considering sex together and raise all their profits because the government is ordering them to, sweet!

Nope--insurance companies have to get state approval for rates for the commonly-required types of insurance. They're not going to get it if they jack the price up too much. (What we actually see is the opposite--regulators trying to hold rates down to the point insurance companies tell them where to stick it and leave the state entirely.)

That sounds less like a "Nope--' than like a "Yep, but also--". Regulations typically take the form "You must X, and your competitors must also X." Some regulations such as price caps are a net harm to every firm, true; but other regulations can be a net help to your firm because their restrictions on your competitors indirectly help you more than those regulations directly hurt you by restricting you. Regulatory agencies go in for both kinds.

Or are you saying the same states that banned sex-dependent premiums ordered insurers to lower men's premiums to match women's but also prohibited them from compensating for that by raising women's premiums? That sounds like it would be a good way to get insurance companies to tell them where to stick it and leave the state entirely.

I'm saying the regulators would make them put men and women in the same pool--men are undercharged, women are overcharged, but the net effect to the insurance company is approximately zero.

 

[Bomb#20]

I'm saying the regulators would make them put men and women in the same pool--men are undercharged, women are overcharged, but the net effect to the insurance company is approximately zero.

Approximately. But the consequence is that who can most accurately calculate the impact of sex on accidents is something the different companies no longer have to compete with one another on. Competition between providers is dying the death of a thousand cuts and that's one more cut. Each cut moves the product's price point another epsilon away from the competitive price toward the monopoly price.

 

[Derec]

LMAO!

Anti-capitalist 'pay what you can' cafe in Canada closes doors after one year

A cafe and coffee shop in Toronto named "The Anarchist," which was a self-described "anti-capitalist" establishment that had a "pay what you can" model of operation, has announced it will shut down after being open for only a year.
The Canadian business opened in March 2022. According to an announcement from The Anarchist's owner, Gabriel Sims-Fewer, the cafe will close on May 30.
[...]
The Anarchist cafe also fulfilled "the dream of most service workers by not having to tolerate the presence of professional class-traitors (pigs and military)," according to Sims-Fewer, who added that cafe offered chances to experiment "with living and working in ways that don't enthusiastically embrace the pure misanthropy of Capitalism."
[...]
At the end of the announcement, Sims-Fewer strings together a few expletives and bolds the text, saying: "F*** the rich. F*** the police. F*** the state. F*** the colonial death camp we call 'Canada.'"
Back when the cafe first opened, Sims-Fewer said that he wanted the establishment to be a place for anti-capitalists.

What a dumbass!

 

[Politesse]

LMAO!

Anti-capitalist 'pay what you can' cafe in Canada closes doors after one year

A cafe and coffee shop in Toronto named "The Anarchist," which was a self-described "anti-capitalist" establishment that had a "pay what you can" model of operation, has announced it will shut down after being open for only a year.
The Canadian business opened in March 2022. According to an announcement from The Anarchist's owner, Gabriel Sims-Fewer, the cafe will close on May 30.
[...]
The Anarchist cafe also fulfilled "the dream of most service workers by not having to tolerate the presence of professional class-traitors (pigs and military)," according to Sims-Fewer, who added that cafe offered chances to experiment "with living and working in ways that don't enthusiastically embrace the pure misanthropy of Capitalism."
[...]
At the end of the announcement, Sims-Fewer strings together a few expletives and bolds the text, saying: "F*** the rich. F*** the police. F*** the state. F*** the colonial death camp we call 'Canada.'"
Back when the cafe first opened, Sims-Fewer said that he wanted the establishment to be a place for anti-capitalists.

What a dumbass!

Ooh, I have so many examples of capitalist cafe and coffee shops that have closed their doors recently. Shall I start listing them all as proof of the failure of capitalism?

 

[Derec]

Ooh, I have so many examples of capitalist cafe and coffee shops that have closed their doors recently. Shall I start listing them all as proof of the failure of capitalism?

I did not offer this as a "proof of the failure of socialism". The actually existing socialist countries are proof enough of that.
I offered it as a funny vignette about a dumbass trying to run a business while espousing anti-capitalist ideas and alienating many of his would-be customers.

 

[bilby]

I did not offer this as a "proof of the failure of socialism". The actually existing socialist countries are proof enough of that.

The last example you gave of an "actually existing socialist country" was a country that hasn't actually existed for thirty plus years.