Nation's Insurance Co's Team up with Sympathetic Politicians to Push for National Disaster Fund

Is it time for a national disaster fund? Some point to the Katrina aftermath and say so.

It's been a bi-partisan pet project of both Republican Governor Jeb Bush of hurricane-laden Florida and Sen. Steve Geller, a Democrat and past-president of the National Association of Insurance Legislators, not to mention the nation's insurance industry as a whole for some time. But those of us not building (and rebuilding) on flood plains and fault lines have serious concerns over what, according to many, amounts to little more than a socialization of risk via a poor tax to augment big business and bigger mansions.

Note this has nothing to do with "rescuing people" just profit.

Costly Katrina Renews Talk of National Disaster Fund
CharlotteObserver.com

"Our argument has been, if it's a big enough storm - a $100 billion storm - it will bankrupt companies and the banks will go next," said state Sen. Steve Geller, a Democrat and past-president of the National Association of Insurance Legislators, which has promoted a national disaster fund. "The only one that can handle that is the federal government and if they're going to write a check anyway, it's better to do it ahead of time and plan than react without a plan."

But support from politicians in the Midwest and Northeast, which sustain snowstorms and tornadoes but nothing on the magnitude of a hurricane, has been hard to find.

Many of those states "view themselves as getting the short end of the stick and they don't support using federal tax dollars to help states that are at risk because people chose to live on the coast or over an (earthquake) fault line," said Robert Hartwig, chief economist for the Insurance Information Institute.

Florida Gov. Jeb Bush said Monday he believes Hurricane Katrina could start changing minds.

"Now that we're moving into a period where we expect more storms that could spark more consensus," he said.

Some things should be more socialized to be fair. Or some things like protecting NY financial centers and Texas oil fields from terrorist attack that fall on us all because they specifically benefit us all. But this smacks of not only rewarding bad decisions on behalf of both affluent flood plain, sea side and fault line rebuilders but the private insurance and investment industries that should know better.

I don't know that it's my job to make sure insurance companies see profit, or Rush Limbaugh can rebuild in Palm Beach without penalty. Your thoughts?

[edit on 6-9-2005 by RANT]

God No!!!!!

The insurance companies and some bought off politicans coupled with a slick add capmpaign managed to get California into the earthquake insurance business. Prior to this, if you wanted to offer homeowners policies in the state you had to also offer quake insurance. Now cause it is through the state, you pay 5 times as much for less coverage. Hows a 50K deductable grab you plus our home would be 1900 a year for quake alone.

This just smacks of a way to keep funding the lucrative end of the business and handing the smelly end back to the taxpayers.

Originally posted by FredT
This just smacks of a way to keep funding the lucrative end of the business and handing the smelly end back to the taxpayers.

Agreed. And I too think there's just some dirty underhanded private/public hand greasing going on here. At least I can't see the benefit to taxpayers at all. As "conspiracies" go, this one's pretty cut and dry.