Pollies are the uninsured motorists of the world.

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We, the responsible people of the world, always have to pay for these types when their lack of insurance leaves them helpless.

-- (Taxpayer@sniffyerthumb.jerk), January 06, 2000

Answers

Aw, come on...I know a couple of Pollies who don't drive that bad! And a couple of them don't even drive...

-- Mad Monk (madmonk@hawaiian.net), January 06, 2000.

LOL! What a great analogy.

-- (@ .), January 06, 2000.

Ah, the infamous insurance analogy. At least the auto insurance angle puts a new, although not totally original, twist on this schtick.

I've been asked many times as people have ranted at me for my "polly" views here if I carry fire insurance on my home. Of course I do. Why? Because ther eis a real chance that my house could burn down. After all, I have fires in my house on a daily basis. Between a gas stove, a gas water heater, a gas furnace and two firplaces there are controlled fires in my house on a regular basis. Furthermore, there is abundant evidence that fires can start for other reasons. Electrical fires are not uncommon, and as I do have electricity in the house I am therefore at a small but non-trivial risk of electrical fires. Add it all up: sufficient risk to take action.

I do not, however, carry flood insurance even though many who live near me do. Why? It is not that I enjoy taking the risk but that I have determined that the risk is too low to make the cost of flood insurance worthwhile. I live at the top of a hill with excellent drainage all around the house. When other people in my vicinity have had several inches, or even several feet of standing water in their basement I have been high and dry. This situation has held for a number of years in flooding caused by heavy rains and by rapid snow melt. There is sufficient evidence to convince me that the risk is so low as to be acceptable.

You know, if you fork over enough money you can get somebody out there to insure darn near anything. Does that mean you are going to insure yourself against every danger real and imagined you can cover on your income? A man I know once bought a rider to his home-owner's policy that covered damage from construction crane accidentally dropping construction materials on his home. Sound strange? Not when you consider that he had hired a crane to lift a pre-fab sunrooom off of the street, over his house and then lower it into the back yard as close to the house as possible. But I assure you, the term of that rider was one day, and it was one day because that was all the insurance the situation warranted. Would you, after hearing that someone else was preparing for a crane dropping construction materials on his roof, immediately run out and purchase a rider to your policy covering that situation?

I thought not. So why is that anyone who examined the Y2K situation and felt that high levels of "insurance" were not necessary is compared to the damn fools out there driving around with no insurance?

Is it just because they had the audacity to disagree with you?

-- Paul Neuhardt (neuhardt@ultranet.com), January 07, 2000.


I am glad I spent my money on motor insurance instead of preps.

The only y2k problem that has affected me so far was driving in the back of someone at 0130 on New Year's Day, and inflicting #1200 worth of damage on their car. I don't think they would have accepted two hundred cans on tuna in payment.

Let's kill this insurance analogy now:

Insurance is a privately managed collective fund - lots of people pay relatively small premiums so that a few people need not be bankrupt by expensive accidents (I can't afford #1200, but I can cough up the premium). People are quite happy to see their money help out someone else because they know that one day that someone else might be themselves.

y2k prepping is not like insurance because you are the only contributor and benefactor of your fund, and it does not lack the "compassionate" nature of insurance. How many y2k preppers were hoarding for the benefit of other people? I doubt their motives were "Oh! Look at all these poor ignorant fools not prepping; I must stash lots of supplies for them in case everything goes wrong!"... How about "Hahahahahaaaa! Fools, fools, fools... I can't wait to watch you starve! The boot will be on the other foot come y2k etc"

I know this attitude was not held by the majority of preppers, but can e please can this whole insurance metaphor. People buy insurance because it provides financial protection from a wide variety of risks at relatively little cost. Most people didn't buy y2k "insurance" because it was too expensive, and undermined the whole idea of traditional insurance. No-one is going to buy another car to insure them against the loss of their current one!

And don't forget that traditional insurance only works because of a collective effort; y2k prepping was an extremely self-centred activity in most cases, with relatively few community efforts.

Here's a question for you:

Where does selfishness end, and self-preservation begin? (assuming that one is justifiable, and one isn't)

-- Look's like I'm going to (Cr@sh.com), January 07, 2000.


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