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Being a young driver aged less than 25 is quite uncomfortable from the insurance perspective as you’re always charged with premiums that can be twice as high as your parents pay. That is because insurance companies regard younger car owners as being the most risky age group to insure. And while this may seem as a form of discrimination, the hard facts are on their side and you can’t do anything about it. Young drivers have less experience, end up in accidents more often and tend to take more risk while behind the wheel, which reflects in more at fault claims and more serious accidents. Still, even if you make part of this age group this doesn’t mean that there are no ways to get affordable insurance for your policy. Here are a few tips on how to do it right:

Ask your parents to include you to their policy

Although it may seem like a move that’s not very independent this still may help you save some money. Especially if your parents are paying the premiums. By including a high risk teen driver to the policy the premiums will automatically go up, however it will still cost you less than buying two separate policies for parents and the teen driver apart. So consider talking to your parents about such a move, especially if they already have very competitive premiums on their policy. (more…)

The GOP has a field of candidates who want to run for President. When the race began, the front runner was Mitt Romney but, when Rick Perry joined in, he surged into a lead. Whether he can maintain that lead is something only time can tell. The first signs are that the enthusiasm of the evangelicals and tea-partiers may not be shared by the rest of the country. Governor Perry has some interestingly partisan ideas and a Texan style of delivering them. But, if Perry is not likely to be electable, where does that leave Mitt Romney. He’s more the thinking-person’s candidate and, of course, he’s controversial” because of his health care reforms in Massachusetts. (more…)

These are the days of political correctness where, on issues of gender, race, religion and other divisive issues, we are expected to remain civil and avoid anything that might stir up trouble. This actually makes life quite difficult because, if real change is going to be made, there must be an honest debate about the issues. So, for example, should men and women receive the same pay for the same work? This should not be controversial. If the employer benefits equally from the work done by both sexes, there’s no reason to reward one more than the other. Except there’s no transparency. Only a tiny percentage of employers make pay grades public, so it’s almost impossible to discover whether any group of individuals is being paid less than the average for that type of work. Now let’s turn the question around. Would you expect a man to be asked to pay more just because he’s a man?

It’s a statistical fact that women live longer than men, so let’s say a man and a woman of the same age ask for quotes to buy a life insurance policy with the same guaranteed death benefits. If the insurance companies base the quotes on the math, the man pays more because he will live for fewer years. There are two reasons for this. First, the man may not work for as long before ill-health forces retirement, i.e. the payments will stop. Second, as women live longer, there are more years for the investment of the payments to build up in value. So women can expect to pay less than men for the same product. Except this would be a positive discrimination on the basis of sex. Presumably that’s illegal.

Moving on to insuring drivers, it’s a statistical fact that women are safer drivers than men. They are more likely to obey the law and generally drive less recklessly. So even if they are involved in accidents, they are traveling more slowly and so there’s less injury to passengers and less damage to the vehicles. Because premium rates are based on the risk an insured will claim, women should pay less than men. Except, unless the insurance company offers a women-only policy, men and women are grouped together so there’s no problem in giving to same rates to individuals with the same safety records. The averages will simply show that women pay less than men. (more…)

In one of the more extraordinary moments in the Presidential Candidate Debates, Rick Perry came out fighting, citing the example of Galileo to argue that we shouldn’t trust climate scientists. In fact, when you look at what he actually said, “Galileo got outvoted for a spell”. Does this mean we’re back to believing the sun goes round the Earth? Ah well, such are the things people say when they get on national television. For the scientists who have moved beyond the idea of the Earth being flat, they propose we are changing the climate by continuing to pump vast amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. One of the ways we do this is by driving so many miles in vehicles filled with expensive gas (that’s gas in our sense of the word and not to be confused with liquid petroleum gas or autogas). No matter whether autogas is more environmentally friendly, the underlying fact is we drive too many miles.

In a way, it’s not our fault. We have an enormous country and, when gas was cheap, it never occurred to us to design our towns and cities for efficiency. If you look at Europe, many major cities have integrated public transport systems that rely on local citizens to do some walking (or, in some cities, cycling). Anyone seen walking in one of our cities is considered either one of the urban poor or mentally disabled. With very poor public transport inside cities and an even worse provision between cities (now including the option to be molested when trying to board an airplane), everyone relies on the “car”. It’s a necessity of life.

Insurance is all about sharing the cost of loss among all drivers. To make this as fair as possible, the insurers offer discounts to those who are considered the safest. This encourages everyone to avoid accidents. It’s a statistical fact that, if you only drive a few miles a week and avoid driving at commuting times and at night, there’s a lower risk of an accident. It’s the same for those who live out in remote rural areas. With very few other vehicles on the road, the chances of a collision are small. Until now, insurance companies have refused to trust people to make an honest declaration of their mileage. But, with new technology available, your vehicle can transmit information about when and how far you drive. It can also tell the insurer how well you drive, e.g. send a message if there’s sharp braking and swerving from side to side. (more…)