Contrary to popular belief, the Insurance companies are not broke

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You cannot make this stuff up. Anyone who reads this blog knows how frustrated I get with the insurance industry’s constant complaints that “[Fill in the Blank] is responsible for rising premiums.” The [Fill in the Blank] is always something different depending on what year it is—sinkholes, water claims, fraud, trial lawyers, hurricanes, reinsurance, political instability, public adjusters.

Interestingly, the industry never looks in the mirror and even contemplates that the[Fill in the Blank] could be as a result of their own actions. In that view, look at the recent SunSentinel article, Insurance rates set to rise as legislature fails again to enact reform:

South Florida property owners can expect property insurance rates to increase because the Florida Legislature failed to enact laws to curb abuses by contractors and trial attorneys, two insurance industry trade associations are saying.

In a statement released as the session drew to a close last week, the Florida Property & Casualty Association blamed Sen. Miguel Diaz de la Portilla, R-Miami, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, for failing to bring up a bill that would have “prevented a handful of vendors and their lawyers from stealing homeowners’ insurance policy rights and using them to pad their own pockets.”

“Now, as a result, even without a hurricane making landfall, property insurance rates are set to skyrocket for all Floridians while a small group of greedy vendors and their lawyers get rich. Florida deserves better,” the association said.

Diaz de la Portilla, in an interview Monday, shot back at the insurance industry, saying he brokered a compromise bill intended to rein in abuses. But the industry “showed their true colors,” he said, by rejecting the compromise because it did not eliminate the ability of homeowners to assign benefits of their policies to third-party contractors.

Seriously? Because Assignment of Benefits reform was not enacted, rates are going to increase? So by that logic, each year that the legislature enacts reform, rates will decrease, correct?

Decrease =?

Source: http://www.propertyinsurancecoveragelaw.com/2016/03/articles/insurance/fill-in-the-blank/