Welcome to the Era of the $20k Family Car Insurance Bill • Hacker News Board

Re: Welcome to the Era of the $20k Family Car Insurance Bill

#21

Post by buffington » Mon, Oct 21, 2024, 5:52 PM UTC

dkhenry wrote: post #6

legitster wrote: post #3

This article isn't very useful because it doesn't distinguish between liability and collision coverage. It doesn't matter how young the driver is, if you put them in a cheap small used car, you only need liability coverage which is pretty cheap.

If you have a child on your policy, and you have a collision on your policy, then your child will be required to be included in that policy. Insurance companies don't accept that you can live in a household, but won't be allowed to drive the new car, so they will charge you like the child is driving the new car under any circumstance.

My insurance company requires me to sign an affidavit affirming that my adult child will not drive a car insured by said company. If my adult child does drive my car and gets in a collision, the affidavit is used by the insurance company to absolve themselves of any financial responsibilities related to the collision.

I think it'd be reasonable aside from one obvious edge case: my adult child is blind and will never drive a car, yet I have to sign a new affidavit every time I renew my policy (every 6 months).

Re: Welcome to the Era of the $20k Family Car Insurance Bill

#22

Post by janetmissed » Mon, Oct 21, 2024, 5:52 PM UTC

PreInternet01 wrote: post #9

baggy_trough wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Well, the more expensive driving a car is, the better! What an astonishing statement.

Why? I'm against private car ownership. Ask me all about it...

Making using a car more expensive doesn't disincentivize car ownership or usage when there is no other alternative. Like you can't rely on public transportation, biking, or ride shares to get to your job in most parts of this country. The rising costs of the past few years haven't reduced personal car usage as much as its made the lives of people near the bottom of the income scale much more stressful and expensive.

Re: Welcome to the Era of the $20k Family Car Insurance Bill

#23

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Oct 21, 2024, 5:53 PM UTC

toomuchtodo wrote: post #5

taylodl wrote: post #4

Distracted driving + expensive new cars = "crazy" premiums. We all pay the price when new cars are priced in the upper 5-digit and 6-digit range and a fender-bender costs $5K - $10K.

Automakers charge what the be auto market can support. They can limit supply to keep prices high. Used car market is limited by new car market sales. Structural demographics means there are less workers every year (auto repair labor costs). Costs are unlikely to decline.

[deleted]

Re: Welcome to the Era of the $20k Family Car Insurance Bill

#24

Post by rozap » Mon, Oct 21, 2024, 5:53 PM UTC

The 20k price tag in the article is pretty clickbait-y. It talks about families with 4 kids, and, if you have 4 16-20 year olds all driving, the chance of a 20k bill is not far fetched. If someone wanted to make a bet with me that their 4 kids wouldn't cause >$20k of damage over a year, and I get $20k if they don't, I'm not sure I'd take that bet.

We gathered a ton of quotes, and yea there are crazy prices at the end of the tail (see: https://www.coveragecat.com/cheapest-car-insurance/texas#quo...) but otherwise the distribution skews to the left. When we trained a simple model on that data (https://www.coveragecat.com/calculator/carrier-comparison) it was pretty obvious that age is the primary variable in premium. You can fiddle with the variables and see what changes, spoiler alert, age has the highest correlation with premium.

Anyone who has met a teenager in 2024 would not be surprised by this.

Re: Welcome to the Era of the $20k Family Car Insurance Bill

#25

Post by hampelm » Mon, Oct 21, 2024, 5:53 PM UTC

That doesn't seem an absurd price for owning six cars?

Re: Welcome to the Era of the $20k Family Car Insurance Bill

#26

Post by lbwtaylor » Mon, Oct 21, 2024, 5:53 PM UTC

My parents transferred an old car to my older brother and insured me and him on it and signed something saying we were not permitted to drive the other cars.

Not sure if that is permitted/possible everywhere, but the problem is if the parents drive nice cars the insurer presumes the kids will also drive them (and crash them).

Re: Welcome to the Era of the $20k Family Car Insurance Bill

#27

Post by RIMR » Mon, Oct 21, 2024, 5:54 PM UTC

baggy_trough wrote: post #8

PreInternet01 wrote: post #7

Well, the more expensive driving a car is, the better! That being said, I'm pretty sure that liability insurance for a family is not USD 20K, unless your idea of 'family' is, well, pretty extensive? Collision insurance? Sure, with EVs becoming more popular, that will only go up. But, yeah, omelettes, eggs, blah...

> Well, the more expensive driving a car is, the better! What an astonishing statement.

Driving is hideously inefficient. It should be the most expensive option, because taking a 2-ton machine with you everywhere you go should be considered a luxury.

Re: Welcome to the Era of the $20k Family Car Insurance Bill

#28

Post by baggy_trough » Mon, Oct 21, 2024, 5:55 PM UTC

PreInternet01 wrote: post #20

baggy_trough wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds terrible, why would you be against that?

'cause privately-owned cars are a significant contributor to mortality, and take up, like, 99% more space than is warranted? I mean, everyone (well mostly everyone) is absolutely mortified by commercial aviation, which, like, commits literally 0.01% of those sins on a global scale?

If you think mostly everyone is absolutely mortified by commercial aviation, I think you must be in some sort of bubble. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Re: Welcome to the Era of the $20k Family Car Insurance Bill

#29

Post by scottLobster » Mon, Oct 21, 2024, 5:55 PM UTC

PreInternet01 wrote: post #15

scottLobster wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No shit. And you're suggesting lots of financial pain for people who can't afford it in the name of your ideology.

No, I'm not suggesting any kind of financial pain at all. Do I support the ability of people to travel to their job, shopping centers, or any destination they like? Absolutely! Do I think a privately owned vehicle, which spends 90%+ of its active life being parked in spaces that could be utilized much better otherwise, is the best way to achieve those abilities? Nope. Sorry.

Oh, so you're in favor of playing Sim-City with the infinite money cheat codes.

Cool. Because if you were suggesting that in the real world then, at least in America, you're suggesting a complete overhaul of almost all transportation infrastructure and saying that no average person will have to spend an extra dollar to pay for it somehow. Is Mexico paying for it or something?

Re: Welcome to the Era of the $20k Family Car Insurance Bill

#30

Post by wcunning » Mon, Oct 21, 2024, 5:55 PM UTC

I have two vehicles, my girlfriend has another one, and despite living in one of the higher insurance premium areas in one of the highest insurance premium states in the country (Oakland County, Michigan), our total bill with full coverage and relatively low deductibles is around $7k/yr. A family with 4 cars total (two driving age kids, two parents with cars to drive to different jobs) should not be massively more expensive, likely only $3~4k more than my bill, making it about half of the headline number. To do worse than that, you'd have to live in the worst part of inner city Detroit with the highest insurance rates and have full coverage or massively more expensive vehicles... I don't think the math checks out, really.

I do know people who have very very high bills, but they have one of 1) very high end cars (911 GT3 RS, Bentley, etc.) 2) something rare insured at full value of its rare nature or 3) actively stating to the insurer that it's a track car being raced on the weekends. All of those happen around me, but those aren't the modal case.