Dunes
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16 responses to “Dunes”
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You’re probably headed home by now.. but would like to get your “take” on how insurance works for homes on Emerald Isle… is it market insurance or govt subsidized?
thanks!
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I don’t know how the homes here are insured. Interesting question, though. A hurricane hitting this coastline will cause billions of dollars of damage.
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These places would be the among the first places to see impacts from rising seas – not from increased sea level but from increased sea level in combination with high tides and storm surges… like Hurricane Sandy…
I’m surprised they are “insurable”.. I cannot get flood insurance on my house unless I get a special policy through my own homeowners but through the FEMA flood program…
https://www.fema.gov/national-flood-insurance-program/How-Buy-Flood-Insurance
I too love the dunes and the ocean… but not subsidies for insurance!!!
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But Larry, if we don’t have government subsidized insurance, we’ll be abandoning those beach residents. . .
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Izzo – touche! so we subsidize the rich and abandon the unrich? Oh wait.. .. I’m starting to get a more clear focus!
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What subsidies? How about a few facts?
From January 1, 1978, FEMA flood insurance paid 618 claims totaling $7.93 million in the Town of Emerald Isle. Property owners there have 2,736 policies, and each year, they pay $2.54 million in annual premiums as of April 30, 2017. That’s 32% of all claims ever paid there.
In comparison, for NC as a whole, annual premiums are 9% of the total claims paid. In Maryland, it’s 3%, Louisiana 2%, Virginia 11%.
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The point is that the private insurance market will not offer insurance and the govt by offering insurance is basically guaranteeing coverage for catastrophic losses that the private sector will not insure.
” Can FEMA’s Flood Insurance Program Afford Another Disaster?” google this for the link
here’s the reality:
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CqULt5NXYAAzR0Y.jpg
The govt is subsidizing insurance for something the private sector will not. what does that tell us?
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It means the government is subsidizing risky behavior and low return projects. And this can apply to student loans, moral hazards and bailouts in finance, weather insurance, and economic development in areas the private sector does not find worthy of investment.
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and I have to agree.. … with the exception of when you have to trade off entitlements with the costs of economic development to reduce the entitlement burden.. How do you make that calculation? realistically now.. not some wack-a-doodle “let them eat cake”… 😉 Realistically a 50 year old with minimal skills is not going to move to an urban area for work.. right? So is it worthwhile to try to encourage economic development so he will have work and not need entitlements?
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I’m not Marie Antoinette, but I don’t see much success when the government tries to go against markets and trends. If there are opportunities for development, I’d prefer having the private sector lead.
We mentioned on another thread that the Soviet Union had reasonable health care and education, but it produced very few successful enterprises that did not depend on the country’s natural resources. There are jobs in cities for people with minimum skills (e.g. driving a cab). These may not be as attractive, but it beats a job in a coal mine that is gone and is not coming back.
As you can tell from my earlier comments, I’d like to see the government significantly scale back its subsidies in a number of markets and areas.
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the standard is not whether the govt does something or not. The standard is do people live longer and pass less for health care… govt vs free-market.
on the minimal -skill jobs.. is there affordable housing at those wages?
just because the coal mine is gone does not mean there are not other economic replacements…. though…. internet supposedly means “work” can be done wherever it is. Call centers … data / cloud storage – like VITA has in Lebanon , Va… everything you eat in a city – from eggs to burgers to chicken legs and pork chops is grown and processed/manufactured NOT in urban areas…
but a question at you about the FEMA flood program. If the govt got out of that – 100% – what would happen to places like Emerald Isle?
serious question…
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I didn’t say government does nothing. Don’t paint it that way. And you switched topic again to healthcare and education. Neither one is free market even in the U.S. and I think both could be made more efficient (with an appropriate role for government), but that is the subject for another thread.
And again, I didn’t say there couldn’t be economic replacements in these areas. Just let the market direct it. There are already people who know their stuff looking for datacenter locations for instance (factoring in environmental risk, transportation, electicity, proximity to business partners and customer who may need to visit, etc.).
Regarding Emerald Isle, if they keep subsidizing risky behavior the financial results will be catastrophic and growing as your graphic shows. If the government can’t get out entirely, it needs to stop new loans. If people want to build in places like this they should “self-insure”. Otherwise, risk is just being passed to everyone else.
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re: ” And again, I didn’t say there couldn’t be economic replacements in these areas. Just let the market direct it. ”
so it’s the idea that govt should not do economic development – anywhere?
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My first sentence was “I didn’t say government does nothing.” Government should have a role in infrastructure, education, regulation of private monopolies like utilities, etc., all of which can impact economic development. I don’t want to see government trying to directly influence data centers for instance (CNBC looked at 11 recent deals and found they cost $2M per job) or chicken legs or pork chops. . .
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Izzo – Do you have a general stance on the govt being involved with economic development or is it on a case by case basis?
Do you and I both support the govt being involved in economic development – but we differ on what things?
here’s one of my general stances… if we are going to pay entitlements – should govt be involved in efforts in things like education and economic development if it can reduce the entitlement burden?
do we differ on this? isn’t govt support of education and job training… essentially focused on economic development, more employed and less entitlements ?
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