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Killing with a car costs $1.6M, California requires drivers to carry $30K

maxmautner.com

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Re: Killing with a car costs $1.6M, California requires drivers to carry $30K

#21

Post by rpdillon »

mrtesthah wrote: post #9
lostlogin wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Forget the ridiculous minimum coverage requirements, a huge percentage of Americans drive around with no insurance whatsoever Here in New Zealand you aren’t required to have insurance at all, although every gets healthcare and lost wages paid for (ACC) in cases of injury, which is a kind of insurance.

So in order words, non-drivers are forced to subsidize drivers (who risk the lives and property of others)? Here’s a comparison of US public subsidization of the costs of driving, from the same blog: https://maxmautner.com/2026/09/10/paying-for-driving.html

Non-drivers benefit from roads and vehicles, since they are part of society. Many non-drivers order from Amazon, for example, and are reliant on someone being able to actually deliver what they ordered.

I'm responding to you, because this smacks of the same rhetoric I hear with schools: "Oh, all the non-parents have to subsidize the education of other people's kids?" Well, yes, those kids grow up and deliver your mail or treat your cancer.

Re: Killing with a car costs $1.6M, California requires drivers to carry $30K

#22

Post by robotnikman »

deepsun wrote: post #17
lostlogin wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Forget the ridiculous minimum coverage requirements, a huge percentage of Americans drive around with no insurance whatsoever Here in New Zealand you aren’t required to have insurance at all, although every gets healthcare and lost wages paid for (ACC) in cases of injury, which is a kind of insurance.

Who pays for that?

Taxpayers. Imo if we didn't have such high national debt in the US, those interest payments to the debt could have instead been used for something like national health insurance. The politicians of the past really screwed us all with the debt.

Re: Killing with a car costs $1.6M, California requires drivers to carry $30K

#23

Post by jeffbee »

> In-car dongles that track jerky driving, crash event recorders, and driver monitoring systems now let an insurer observe behavior directly and price it.

Uh, but not in California, because of 1988's Prop. 103. Telematics for insurance pricing are completely unavailable in California.

Re: Killing with a car costs $1.6M, California requires drivers to carry $30K

#24

Post by Barrin92 »

is that accurate? Here in Germany minimal Kfz-Haftpflichtversicherung is I believe 7 million in personal injuries and 1 million in property damages. So if a broke guy in the US runs you over and causes you half a million in health damages, puts you out of work and totals your car you'll get 30k from their insurance? How can you legally let people on the road like this

Re: Killing with a car costs $1.6M, California requires drivers to carry $30K

#25

Post by theossuary »

robotnikman wrote: post #22
deepsun wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who pays for that?

Taxpayers. Imo if we didn't have such high national debt in the US, those interest payments to the debt could have instead been used for something like national health insurance. The politicians of the past really screwed us all with the debt.

And the current politicians. 2.2T just this year, unbelievable.

Re: Killing with a car costs $1.6M, California requires drivers to carry $30K

#26

Post by cucumber3732842 »

deepsun wrote: post #19
Gibbon1 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Something people that bitch about the high cost of California vs Florida won't mention is how high auto and home owners insurance is in Florida. Florida is a high risk state with a lot of fraud.

Yet at the same time federal government allowed home insurance to be non-actuarial (aka insolvent) for natural disasters like hurricanes. So essentially the rest of the country subsidise residents in disaster-prone areas. So Californians pay to make home insurance lower for Floridians.

>So Californians pay to make home insurance lower for Floridians.

More like some the people in Ohio or Maine or Wisconsin pays for both. CA and FL are both natural disaster dense compared to the colder states.

Re: Killing with a car costs $1.6M, California requires drivers to carry $30K

#27

Post by loloquwowndueo »

kube-system wrote: post #3

You basically need to insure yourself when using US roads. Forget the ridiculous minimum coverage requirements, a huge percentage of Americans drive around with no insurance whatsoever -- 20% or more in some states.

lol as a Canadian my insurance company recommends the maximum civil liability coverage (2 million) if one plans to drive in the US. Those lawsuit-happy Americans and their private health care systems haha.

Re: Killing with a car costs $1.6M, California requires drivers to carry $30K

#28

Post by nrr »

deepsun wrote: post #19
Gibbon1 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Something people that bitch about the high cost of California vs Florida won't mention is how high auto and home owners insurance is in Florida. Florida is a high risk state with a lot of fraud.

Yet at the same time federal government allowed home insurance to be non-actuarial (aka insolvent) for natural disasters like hurricanes. So essentially the rest of the country subsidise residents in disaster-prone areas. So Californians pay to make home insurance lower for Floridians.

Uh, what's the transmission mechanism for this?

It's true that the National Flood Insurance Program does this, but that's only for flooding (which, admittedly, is a big part of hurricane damage...). Flood coverage is however not a standard rider on homeowner's insurance policy products, and I'm also unsure whether it can ever be. I've only ever seen it offered as an additional policy product.

The concern over pricing below the actuarially fair value is well-placed[0], but I'd urge being precise.

--

0: https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/hp548

Re: Killing with a car costs $1.6M, California requires drivers to carry $30K

#29

Post by A1kmm »

mrtesthah wrote: post #9
lostlogin wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Forget the ridiculous minimum coverage requirements, a huge percentage of Americans drive around with no insurance whatsoever Here in New Zealand you aren’t required to have insurance at all, although every gets healthcare and lost wages paid for (ACC) in cases of injury, which is a kind of insurance.

So in order words, non-drivers are forced to subsidize drivers (who risk the lives and property of others)? Here’s a comparison of US public subsidization of the costs of driving, from the same blog: https://maxmautner.com/2026/09/10/paying-for-driving.html

Note that many countries who have socialised healthcare and/or accident compensation also collect taxes or levies for higher risk activities as part of the base to pay for it all.

For example, all Australian states and New Zealand have fuel excise / taxes where some types of fuel used for motor vehicles have significant extra taxes above normal cost. Some Australian states require drivers to pay an annual personal injury levy to a government department per vehicle (usually just shy of AU$1000/year in Victoria, for example), while others require private insurance covering personal injury. New Zealand has an accident compensation scheme that levies people based on the type of work they do (which factors in risk of work-related injury), and Australia (federally) also levies everyone for healthcare based on income and whether they have private insurance.

The main difference from the US is that medical care is socialised rather than the victims of road injuries (who are not necessarily drivers) subsidising drivers.

Re: Killing with a car costs $1.6M, California requires drivers to carry $30K

#30

Post by throwworhtthrow »

bix6 wrote: post #20

I cannot stand AI writing ffs.

The blog's About page says Max "writes" about transportation, but I'm skeptical he's even read his own slop here, or he would have presumably fixed some of the worst nonsense sentences before posting it. I doubt he even had the courtesy to ask Claude to run a fact-check on its output. Curse anyone who wastes my reading time like this.
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