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credit: bankrate.com

Bidenflation is causing chaos everywhere.  I’m sure, gentle readers, you’re aware of insurers dropping coverage and refusing to write new policies in California, where inflation is always more inflated.  But now, it’s happening in…Wyoming?!  Yes, in Wyoming, as Cowboy State Daily reports:

Every so often, Vincent Boulder of Cheyenne likes to check in on the price of his homeowner and auto insurance policy, just to make sure the numbers are where he expects them to be.

It’s a good practice and, because he was paying attention, he found out before too much time had passed that his insurance rates through USAA had dramatically increased.

‘When I looked, my policy was over $4,600 for the year,’ Boulder told Cowboy State Daily. ‘And I was like, ‘Wow, that is definitely not the number I should be seeing.’

When he pulled up his previous year’s policy, just to be sure he wasn’t imagining that his insurance used to be much cheaper, he saw that it had been $1,900 for a year, or $2,700 cheaper.

My auto coverage has gone up nearly $400 a year, and I’ve yet to see what my home insurance coverage will be, but I’m sure it will be higher.

Some customers aren’t getting higher than usual renewals, they’re getting dropped altogether — despite being longstanding customers.

‘Story, Wyoming, FYI,’ Dale Reeser posted on Facebook. “Anyone with Allstate Homeowners Insurance will be canceled when you are up for renewal. We just got our notice. It said we are in a designated wildfire area.

‘Fifty-two years, $450,000 in premiums with them and not one claim. Also took them six months to come up with this determination. What if you had a claim? Good luck.’

One would think Allstate has more than broken even on Reeser’s policy.  Of course, they don’t break even on everyone’s.

It may be a cliche, but a ‘perfect storm’ is exactly what’s happening now in the insurance industry, said Rocky Mountain Insurers Association’s Executive Director Carole Walker.

‘Everything that insurance pays for is going up at a record pace,’ Walker said. ‘So, the cost to repair and rebuild from lumber to glass to labor shortages — all of those things are escalating, along with inflation.’

Costs that insurers pay to insure themselves, what is called re-insurance, are also going up at record rates.

I’m so old I remember when insurance paid for windshield repairs as a means of not having to pay more expensive replacement claims.  That hasn’t been the case for more years than I can remember.

‘At the same time, we’re seeing record-breaking catastrophes and the risk going up,’ she said. ‘So that includes for Wyoming, wildfire risk or if you’re in a hail-prone area like Cheyenne, hail risk. It’s the most challenging property insurance market that we’ve seen in a generation.’

Another risk in this part of the country is hail, as a Nebraska solar farm discovered in June of 2023:

A solar farm in Nebraska suffered significant hail damage during an extreme weather event that swept through the Great Plains last week.

The 4.375 MWac solar farm in Scottsbluff was damaged on June 23 by the same storm cell that injured eight people at a Wyoming coal mine.

There is a sort-of solution:

As a result of double and triple price spikes, some states are looking at capping insurance rates, Rude said, and possibly even requiring policies be written so insurers can’t just drop customers in areas they don’t want to cover any more.

‘But what they found there was the insurers just said, ‘Well, we’re not going to do that business, then,’ Rude said ‘We’re not going to write wildfire coverage anymore.’

Rude has talked with commissioners in Montana, Idaho, Nevada and Utah about potentially forming a risk pool, which could be used to help underwrite some of the risk.

For that to work in Wyoming, Rude said he would envision a state survey to see who is being hit the hardest by the insurance rate increases.

‘It’s something we’ve talked about,’ he said. ‘It’s just a matter of getting it off the ground, and if there’s a willingness of the state to do things like that.’

Final Thoughts: It’s yet another entirely avoidable doom loop.  Inflation increases the cost of everything, including car repairs and building materials of all kinds.  Roof hail damage costs more to fix, and any kind of car damage is ridiculously expensive.  This is particularly so with electric vehicles, many of which have to be totaled with damage that could be reasonably repaired for conventional vehicles.  In fact, EV damage pay outs are a significant contributing factor for increased premiums on all vehicles.

Insurance companies have to make more than they pay out, obviously.  If inflation and record payouts, many due to dim-witted government policies, upset that balance they can either raise premiums or go out of business.  If they raise premiums too high, people can’t afford insurance.  If that happens, insurance companies lose business and profits.

Government can impose caps on insurance rates, even mandate what coverage companies must offer, but companies always have the option of not writing insurance in those states.  Should that happen, and no company is willing to write policies at a price people can afford, that upsets the entire economy.  Builders replacing roofs, and auto body shops, for example, will be forced to charge less for their services, which has an adverse effect on local economies.  In such places, how can lenders require mortgages on new homes?  How can legislatures require insurance on motor vehicles?

Despite Joe Biden’s ridiculous claims to the contrary, America’s economy is in real trouble, even ignoring our skyrocketing national debt.  It’s virtually impossible for young Americans to afford a first home, and mortgage interest rates are so high few homes are being built and few can afford existing homes.  Fewer home insurance policies mean less profit to balance claim payouts and higher premiums.

Should Biden’s handlers succeed in forcing manufacturers to make mostly electric vehicles, and force Americans to buy them, car insurance will be entirely unaffordable.  As regular readers know, EVs depreciate dramatically in very short periods of time, far faster than conventional vehicles, and they cost tens of thousands more, on average, than conventional vehicles, all of which dramatically increases premiums.

It’s yet another Biden doom loop that shows no sign of diminishing absent a regime change in November.  Even then, unless the Congress is entirely Republican controlled, even Donald Trump will not be able to do what’s necessary to save the economy and the country.  Even then, we can count on Republicans to every day and every way, earn the title: “The Stupid Party.”

They’re in their own doom loop, and are dragging us along.