Our Opinion: The true cost
Don Brown, a former legislator, an expert on insurance and now a senior fellow with R Street’s Florida project, tells of a trick he sometimes plays.
He’ll ask a group to whom he’s speaking to recommend the best restaurant in town. He’ll mention that he’s bringing some friends, and then invite the person whose suggestion he chooses. Oh, he’ll say, and would you mind paying? You can imagine the reaction.
Then he says he was just joking and tells the person that he will pay. Suddenly, the invitation is accepted…
…Still, in a report suggesting ways to reform Florida’s property-insurance marketplace, R.J. Lehmann of the R Street Institute wrote late last year that the state has “a dysfunctional property insurance system that has distorted pricing, undermined competition, and placed a heavy burden on the state’s taxpayers.”…
…This legislative session, this alliance has a number of goals. Companion bills sponsored by Rep. Bill Hager, R-Boca Raton, and Sen. Alan Hays, R-Umatilla, would reduce the exposure of the CAT Fund. Reformers also would like to take the risk of commercial property out of Citizens, move more Citizens policies to the private market and end Citizen’s wind-only insurance. The James Madison Institute offers Mr. Lehmann’s “Ten Reforms to Fix Florida’s Property Insurance Marketplace — Without Raising Rates” (http://bit.ly/1jjbiel)…
…Mr. Brown tells another story, of a grocery store bag boy driving home and seeing a new Corvette for sale.He asks the price, but realizes this is not the car for him. “Price does far more than compensate a seller,” Mr. Brown said. “It sends a signal on the appropriateness of human behavior.”
