Phil’s Diary - [Blog @ http://www.philsdiary.net/]
There are two things in the news that interest me at the moment. The first is the kidnapping in Iraq of a British man, who the kidnappers are threatening to kill. Now, while I may sound rather discompasionate here, I really think the governments stance is the correct one. They say they will not negotiate with terrorists (as in, give in to their demands, or a subset of them). This I feel is the only way to operate. To do anything but would surely open the flood gates for people trying, which is bad no matter which way things go.
What I find worse though is the publicity that the news has given to this situation (and I know, I’m not helping). There are two things the terrorists want. 1) Their demands 2) Publicity. The second of the who may put pressure on the government to give in, and at the very least it gives their cause a good deal of attention. While this is news, the obvious reason people are interested is because it’s sensational, someone might die. There really isn’t need to give it this much attention, no matter how intereting it is.
The second thing that has me interested is that of car insurance. The EU is suggesting they may stop insurance companies taking gender into consideration when working out insurance premiums. This obviously angers most women as they’ll end up paying higher premiums.
My take on this is first that I’m not happy being tarred with a brush, put in a bucket, or classified with everyone else. I’m me. I’m unique (just like everyone else). Why should stereotypes be used to work out how much to charge me?
The obvious answer is that it’s the best way for the insurance company to work out how much of a risk I am. They’re probably pretty good at it to.
So with that in mind you have to swing the other way, as in, why shouldn’t they be able to take everything into account? Gender, race, income, habits, passtimes… everything?
The answer is that really pricly subject of discrimination. In this country politics dictate that we can’t discriminate based on sex and race (to name two). But why not? If white males are more likely to crash than anyone else, why shouldn’t the insurance company charge white males more? The answer is because it’s not particularly politically correct.
There’s good reasons for anti-discrimination, especially if it’s based on simple prejudices (which, thinking about it, is exactly what insurance premiums are based on, how ironic), but this country seems to have a tendancy of positive-discrimination in too many instances.
For many people I suspect insurance is flawed. They pay more because they fit in the same box as other people, but in fact they’re different. And by the same token the insurance companies aren’t allowed to refine their boxes because that’s be discriminatory.
By restricting what the insruance companies ask us, surely we’re only encouraging them to make wild guesses about how risky we are.
Posted by Phil on September 23, 2004 09:15 PM | Categories: Thoughts