What the hell has happened to kids?

[NUKe]

Going on from this a bit ........

Chatting down at the pub the other day, we got onto Car Insurance. We swapped info on costs and companies, and the barmaid (19yo) said her's was £1,600 per year!

Now, when I learned to drive and had my first car at 19, my insurance wasn't astronomical. Can't remember the price, but it was easily affordable even on my pitiful wage. Why have young persons' insurance gone sky high? I know the reasons, and I know why the 18yo male pays a fortune to insure a car - I hear of £700 per month!

If it wasn't astronomical back in the early 70s when I was that age, why is it now?

Why are our young people less responsible and a greater insurance risk these days?

It because we all want the cheapest insurance possible many companies cherry pick the older safer drivers. As a result many Young drivers don’t bother with insurance (The vast majority do) So we then all end up paying an extra premium for this. There are too ways of stopping this
1. Stop insurance companies discriminating on age.
2. Ensure that younger drivers are trained to a much higher standard.
3. Make a third party insurance element part of the road tax and make it car dependent and not driver.
both are possible if the government wants to stop this. Insurance is Supposed to share the risk amongst us all.

[PW]

As a 17y/o back in 1970 a 1200cc Beetle cost me £29, third party, fire and theft.
I was still paying around the £30 mark for an MG Midget in '77 when I decided to go back to the bike.

[karlt]

Going on from this a bit ........

Chatting down at the pub the other day, we got onto Car Insurance. We swapped info on costs and companies, and the barmaid (19yo) said her's was £1,600 per year!

Now, when I learned to drive and had my first car at 19, my insurance wasn't astronomical. Can't remember the price, but it was easily affordable even on my pitiful wage. Why have young persons' insurance gone sky high? I know the reasons, and I know why the 18yo male pays a fortune to insure a car - I hear of £700 per month!

If it wasn't astronomical back in the early 70s when I was that age, why is it now?

Why are our young people less responsible and a greater insurance risk these days?

It because we all want the cheapest insurance possible many companies cherry pick the older safer drivers. As a result many Young drivers don’t bother with insurance (The vast majority do) So we then all end up paying an extra premium for this. There are too ways of stopping this
1. Stop insurance companies discriminating on age.
2. Ensure that younger drivers are trained to a much higher standard.
3. Make a third party insurance element part of the road tax and make it car dependent and not driver.
both are possible if the government wants to stop this. Insurance is Supposed to share the risk amongst us all.

That's three. Problem with 1. is that everyone else's premiums go up - insurers always try to balance the premiums within a group against the risks posed by that group - that's what actuaries are for.

2. I'm all for. There was one of those police arresting daft drivers programmes on the box the other day; a special where they took a sample of driver "types" and retested them. Although some (not all) passed the practical test, once the hazard perception test was taken into account they all failed. There are two elements here; the question of whether the required standard in the test is high enough (my personal feeling is that with some tweaking it is); the other is the degree to which people stop applying what they learnt. But that's another topic.
3. effectively the same problem as 1.

[Mick F]

As a 17y/o back in 1970 a 1200cc Beetle cost me £29, third party, fire and theft.
I was still paying around the £30 mark for an MG Midget in '77 when I decided to go back to the bike.

That's the way I remember the costs.

I know why things are different nowadays - everything's changed - but why was it cheap back then for everybody, but expensive for youngsters now - when older people are still cheap?

"Everybody's" premiums haven't gone up, just youngsters' premiums. Mine is reasonable - and always has been.

[NUKe]

back then insurance business wasn't cut throat insurance companies accepted that youngsters were a loss leader. they didn't hive off different groups but likewise they expected you to stay for life.

[thirdcrank]

We started buying a house in Dec 1969. Three bed Wimpey detached. £4150 on the road. Mortgage was £26 10s pcm, rates £30 pa water rates £6 pa. (And you still got change from half a crown.)

You don't need a track pump for inflation.

[Mick F]

back then insurance business wasn't cut throat insurance companies accepted that youngsters were a loss leader. they didn't hive off different groups but likewise they expected you to stay for life.

I think that is correct. That must be the reason.

Cut throat competition.