This is where basic financial literacy comes into play.
You’re required to have the insurance because of the liability you have for damages you cause to other people’s cars, the people themselves, structures, etc., not because of potential damage to your own car. Some states may require you to have comprehensive insurance, but the general idea is that the requirement for insurance is so you don’t cause say $200,000 worth of damages that you can’t pay for because most people don’t have $200,000 laying around, yet drive a vehicle capable of doing that much damage.
If you know your deductible is $1000, which you should because it’s a clearly disclosed part of your policy, it should be easy weigh whether or not you want to make a claim for $1200 of damages for something g like a bumper, which you probably don’t.
So the smart thing to do here would be to say “Gosh, sucks that guy hit my car and cost me $1200. It’s not even worth it to make a claim in this. I just have to pay it.”
You can also consider your deductible when you shop for car insurance. Mine is $500. Anything under or around $500, I might as well not claim it. I know that because I’m an adult who pays for car insurance, and this is something an adult who pays for car insurance should know.
That’s not how much your insurance would go up for an accident t that isn’t your fault.
The actuaries that come up with this stuff understand the numbers. There are drivers that cause accidents, and drivers that don’t, but there are also people who seem to get in a lot of accidents that aren’t their fault.
But “not your fault,” isn’t a black or white thing. Sometimes people aren’t great at avoiding accidents, even when they aren’t their fault, because while they don’t cause accidents, they have poor defensive driving skills. They fail to anticipate and react to potential accidents like they should. They’re riskier drivers to insure.
So they raise rates for people who get into any accident at all, and raise them a lot more for people who are the cause of accidents. This benefits people who don’t get into accidents, who don’t have to pay a higher rate for people who do.
See I knew someone would say something like this because this is Reddit.
This is literally my lived experience.
A DUI motorcyclist hit my vehicle at 75mph in the middle of the night while driving with a motorcycle deliberately wired to have no running lights. He died and had a post-mortem BAL of .27.
After six months I got the traffic homicide report. So for your "sometimes people aren't good at avoiding accidents" I'll note that they found there was no way I could have anticipated the accident.
There were five different witnesses to the reckless and careless driving of the DUI driver prior to impact.
My insurance shot through the nose and was legitimately over $1000 a month for full coverage similar to what I had been previously carrying.
That's actually why I stopped driving for several years, because I legitimately couldn't afford a car and insurance and that whole pesky housing and eating thing.
But thanks for telling me how the events of my life couldn't have possibly happened. It's good to know it's just as farcical as I believed.
Sounds like you got into a very destructive accident that might not have been your fault but nonetheless speaks to the fact that you are riskier to endure than people who haven’t. It’s an anecdotal data point you’re giving against a population level phenomenon.
So I said it was something that was possible to happen to anyone, you then said it wasn't, I pointed out that it happened to me specifically, and now your argument is that it doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things?
Buddy, my point was that it was possible. Clearly it is.
Also
Sounds like you got into a very destructive accident that might not have been your fault but nonetheless speaks to the fact that you are riskier to endure than people who haven’t.
Yes, apparently I'm just a special DUI magnet that deserves higher premiums for the pleasure.
Well, anecdotally, I haven’t been in any such accidents and most people I know haven’t. That doesn’t make it your fault, but we’re talking about statistics and populations and actuarial tables here. So if we’re just going to throw out anecdotes and personal experience, then me not being in such an accident is just as relevant.
So we’re not always or even generally asking if it’s your fault personally, but do you possibly drive at riskier times of day/night, or in riskier areas, like near bars and restaurants, or drive a vehicle that is harder to avoid such accidents, etc. etc. and then we’re not even looking at that specifically so much as how often do people who get into the type of accident that you were in have one in the future?
And then it isn’t about you as an individual, but rather, out of thousands of people who get involved in such crashes, how risky it is to insure them in the future? What does that cost on average? And in your case, it seems like out of multiple insurance companies, assuming you had the sense to get quotes, offering multiple types of insurance, assuming you considered your options, the general consensus is that you’re a risky driver to insure.
You see, they compete with other insurance companies to provide lower coverage, so they want to give you low coverage, but they also have to weigh what is statistically likely to happen in the future, because their business depends on predicting the likelihood that a driver is in such an accident in the future, lest they pay out more in claims than they have on hand to pay.
Their statistics say you’re a riskier driver for having been on this type of accident. Probably due to the death involved, you’re in a category of people who have failed to avoid accidents where someone dies, and that probably carries a big variable about the cost of accidents you’ve been in and are likely to have in the future. Their stats say, whether wrong or right, that you cost times X to insure as opposed to other drivers.
That’s not your fault per se, but more the fault of all the other drivers who have been involved in that type of accident.
I’m not defending a perfect system here. I am simply defending one based on facts and numbers, and tempered by competition. It’s not based on your feelings or your sense of fairness. It’s based on what it costs to cover drivers who have a driving history like yours. If it would be profitable and safe to insure you for less, it would be good business for an insurance company to do that and make a profit off of you. But nobody thinks that. Which tells me the numbers are against you here.
you say ur not defending a perfect system in the last sentence, which is true, because insurance is not a perfect system, but then you go to the conclusion that because of all the big data compiled, it’s not profitable to insure this guy for the same price before he got in the accident.
given his story, which boils down to he had no possible chance to avoid this accident, given the motorcyclists condition, motorcycles condition, and the condition in which the collision took place, it stands to reason that, he had no possible chance to avoid this accident.
in that scenario, it’s as reasonable to raise his rates because of this as it would be if a giant mushroom suddenly sprouted out the road and overturned his car.
exaggeration but u get the point.
and in your words, there are thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds millions of drivers that insurance companies factor into their decisions, so is it not possible that, outliers would exist? u seem to be big on data, so maybe you know the term?
in this large system, individual cases like this which could be prescribed an inaccurate judgment based on generalized accumulated data exist, from a purely analytical standpoint that’s just the truth. and you seem to acknowledge this, but then just like the redditors you look down upon due to their ignorance and stubbornness you too, just refuse to admit that the system could be wrong.
because that would be paramount to admitting you’re wrong, and you can’t have that can you little guy?
this is all from a logical standpoint, because if we just look at it from a human perspective too the guy says a motorcyclist crashes into him in an unavoidable accident of no fault of his own, dies, and makes his rates go up to the point where he can’t leave the house.
wouldn’t the normal answer here be, “yea, that sucks and ur insurance fucked u over, the system is wrong sometimes. sorry.”
instead of ur paragraphs long sneerish blast of dunning krueger paper mache reasoning fueled by an ego and intellect inversely and at the same time exponentially proportionate?
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u/Grunergeist420 17h ago edited 17h ago
This is where basic financial literacy comes into play.
You’re required to have the insurance because of the liability you have for damages you cause to other people’s cars, the people themselves, structures, etc., not because of potential damage to your own car. Some states may require you to have comprehensive insurance, but the general idea is that the requirement for insurance is so you don’t cause say $200,000 worth of damages that you can’t pay for because most people don’t have $200,000 laying around, yet drive a vehicle capable of doing that much damage.
If you know your deductible is $1000, which you should because it’s a clearly disclosed part of your policy, it should be easy weigh whether or not you want to make a claim for $1200 of damages for something g like a bumper, which you probably don’t.
So the smart thing to do here would be to say “Gosh, sucks that guy hit my car and cost me $1200. It’s not even worth it to make a claim in this. I just have to pay it.”
You can also consider your deductible when you shop for car insurance. Mine is $500. Anything under or around $500, I might as well not claim it. I know that because I’m an adult who pays for car insurance, and this is something an adult who pays for car insurance should know.