Hacker News Reader

What's the price fixing part?

California has been considering enforcing Prop 103 recently, which has begun spooking insurance providers into leaving.

The Insurance Commissioner is also an elected position now, so there is an incentive for them to succumb to populist pressures to climb up the poltical ladder (eg. Govenor, Senator, Congressmember)

Edit: listen to CharlesW. I'm incorrect on the fact that it wasn't enforced until recently

insurance is a scam anyways. the only reason it works is because nothing is supposed to happen. howevever, shit has been happening (thanks to weak enforcement of laws) and their easy profit margins are being lost because asset values have balooned

> California has been considering enforcing Prop 103 recently…

Nope, it's been enforced since the start. Right after it passed, insurance companies refunding over $1.2 billion to consumers based on CDI enforcement.

https://consumerfed.org/pdfs/whatworks-report_nov2013_hunter...

> They include ideas such as changing the process for requesting rate hikes

"Requesting" means that prices are fixed to whatever the government feels is "fair".

Reply on news.ycombinator.com