re: Car Insurance - "What is your claim worth"?

There are so many things incorrect in your post. Insurance companies do not pay jackpots. The claims and injuries have to properly documented and settlements usually fall in a range of values based upon the injury sustained. Frivolous lawsuits get dismissed. I turn down lots of them.

Regarding tort reform, reducing the amount recovered by injured persons will only result in increasing insurance company profit. When an amendment was proposed that insurance companies automatically reduced premiums by 10% if the tort reform package was passed, the insurance companies balked. Why? Because it is all about profit.

Moreover, the insurance companies admitted in committee that the tort reform measures would not result in a reduction of premiums and that the reasons Louisiana had higher insurance premiums included-the quality of our roads, the large number of uninsured motorists (which results in more claims made by people who are insured against their own policy for property damage), the fact that our minimal limits are 15K which is the lowest in the country and that there are more single and poor people in Louisiana (which their actuaries place a higher risk of being in an accident), and unenforced distracted driving laws. It is so much more complicated than taking away access to the courts for people who have been damaged by distracted or negligent drivers.

Imagine if the "reforms" had passed and you got in a car wreck and your property damage was more than 5k, there is NOTHING to stop an insurance company from denying the claim, even though they are at fault, and require you to wait three years and spend several thousand dollars to go before a jury trial. Most people would give up and not pursue it because the cost benefit analysis says it is not worth it. And guess what, insurance company profits go up.

I ask you, lets say you make a product, and you can pass legislation that makes it cheaper for you to make the same product, do you pass on the savings to the consumer, or do you put more money in your pocket? Insurance companies will just put more money in their pocket and your rights to recover have been curtailed in the event that you are wronged.