Is it sexist for the insurance industry to take gender into account when setting its premiums?

SardineQueen - The insurance industry won't fall in if they aren't allowed to use sex as a factor because they can price on a whole host of other factors that are also correlated with risk.

There are plenty of factors they don't currently base their pricing on (some of which may have significant correlation with risk) and they manage just fine.

HerBex - I do.

I think if a woman is prepared to accept the same quality of cut for the same short back and sides type style, from the same sort of starting point, then she should be able to get it for the same price as a man.

The court case about that (back in the '80s?) was a travesty. Hopefully things like this will help to get it over turned.

So do you think hairdressers and cosmetics retailers should have to charge the same for men's and women's haircuts/ products, Jeanine?

Please explain how you think the sky won't fall in for the insurance industry if they are no longer allowed to use any statistical differences between things to assess risk?

The entire definition of insurance is it is agreement to take on a risk. If you are going to ban the ability of insurers to assess risk and price accordingly, then you no longer have insurance.

If you want to do away with the insurance industry and instead have everything run by the state then that is your perogative. I think it would be a shame though.

I don think it's quite as simple as "statistically, men are worse drivers than women".

As I understood it, and I'm happy to be proved wrong, the statistics showed that women actually have a higher probability of causing an accident, but that the impact was typically much lower. The overall risk is therefore lower for women.

There may be many reasons for this difference, but it's not inconsistent to say that perhaps 'women can't park' and 'men cant keep within speed limits'. Both statements are gross generalisations and the tell you nothing about an individual. There is also nothing to suggest that either are biologically determined.

Allowing the insurance industry to continue to discriminate in this way perpetuates gender stereotypes. It says that stereotyping is fine if you can back it with statistics.

The main argument for this seems to be that pragmatism trumps principle. In truth, it isn't going to be a triumph for equality and neither will the sky fall in on the insurance industry.

Can I just say, I'm an excellent driver and can park in just about any space in one maneouvre. Thanks.

OMG

I know a lot of actuaries. They are assessing risk, they are not looking to exploit. Of course there is an eye for the margins, but they are categorically not loading male rates above and beyone what is indicated by the data.

Also, the data looked at will be accidents/deaths/whatever per thousand journeys or per thousand of the driving population etc. They will not be taking the total number of accidents of men and women and ignoring the fact (if it is a fact?) that there are more men on the road than women.

Also you say car insurance - you are happy for "sexism" as you see it to exist in other types of insurance? That doens't make sense.

Is all of this actually about outrage that statistically men are worse drivers than women, when everybody knows that women are shit drivers who can't park for toffee???

Can I just check something here?

Are all of the people who want car insurance equalised, so that women pay a nominal amount more for their car insurance

Really happy to apply the same process to their pensions (assuming money purchase pension scheme) meaning that men's pensions will suddenly nosedive to the tune of 1000s of pounds?

TBH I'm happy for them to take sex out of the equation if it means I pay £10 more for my car insurance each year and gain 1000s at the end of my life.

Thanks guys!!!

Also interested how people intend to square this with the other risk factors that are taken into account - age, disability etc. Take them all out (end of insurance)? Or are people arguing that men having to pay slightly more than women for car insurance is much much worse than someone with an underlying health condition being denied life insurance to protect their family?

So do you think hairdressers should stop having lists of haircut prices for men and women?

Women get charged more to get their hair cut, purely becuase they have vaginas.

Er no, women get charged more because they are more likely to have long hair and also because often, the style they want takes more skill and more time to cut. So even if you are a woman who simply wants a short back and sides, you are going to be charged more than a man who wants the same haircut.

Should that be made illegal too?

Swallowedafly, that's exaclty what I was trying to say incoherently - it's just such a random example isn't it - and then that person has the cheek to come back and say they're not prejudiced against single mothers. Nah, not much.

I have to agree I don't think sex should be used by car insurance companies to assess risk it is completely sexist but I don't think they are trying to be sexist deliberately. I think it is more about being able to charge more for the sake of charging more for profit because the stats say that men are more likely to have an accident and I believe they would do the same to women/any other group if the stats were different. I don't think it should happen. Just because you have a penis you are going to be charged more. There would be an uproar here if it was just because you have a vagina you are going to be charged more. I can't drive a car properly because apparently my penis gets in the way. Age on the other hand is completely different with age oftens comes a lot more maturity and you are more likely to be careful and responsible and more financially sound. Just my opinion.

Side note:

I guess what I am saying is they are using the stats to exploit rather than to risk assess which i think is very unfair. I also believe that there are more male drivers on the road which would obviously lead to more male accidents that female ones.

That doesn't stack up though.

Otherwise underwear firms, shoe companies, cosmetics companies, clothes companies etc., would all be doing it.

I very much doubt that it is a capitalist plot. I just think it's an actuarial practice.

"I asked a question way above about what on earth the motive would be if it was indeed discriminating against men.. Generally large corporations have men as heads of the board so it makes no sense that the fact women pay less for car insurance would be anything other than for business gain."

Unless insurance companies have made it a social norm to expect to pay more as a male which they can get away with. There could be an argument as generally men earn more than women its easier to get them to pay than women who statistically have less disposable cash.

No sardine, I think people are being sarcastic in response to those who are saying it is a sexist move by insurance companies to discriminate against men.

I asked a question way above about what on earth the motive would be if it was indeed discriminating agaist men.. Generally large corporations have men as heads of the board so it makes no sense that the fact women pay less for car insurance would be anything other than for business gain.

Thanks for the distinction on correlation and causation; had kinda picked that up in the MA Stats module I am currently taking........

And Yes: SQ says it much better than me. Insurers deal not with causation but risk factors.

Are posters on here seriously arguing that the insurance industry has a deliberate sexist policy to do down men wherever they can? That's ludicrous!

What of the fact that some types of insurance are more expensive for women than for men, because for those insurances women have greater risk factors?

Jeanine you are aware I'm sure that insurers are allowed to DECLINE to cover people who they consider a poor risk. The reasons for the declinatures potentially breach a raft of anti-discrimination legislation. Do you think that insurers should be forced to cover all risks at affordable premiums? Again - bang goes the insurance industry.

At the moment insurers ask questions about a raft of things and use them to evaluate their risk - whether the person is sexually active in combination with sexual oritentation for example. They also take into account if people were born in different parts of the world. And age of course. They are forever using statistical averages about different types of people to assess their risk.

Can I also point out that diabetes is not certainly going to kill you, any more than being a young male driver is certainly going to kill you. Both of those things are risk factors which are taken in conjunction with the other aspects of the persons risk profile.

I don't understand this. Are people saying that they want "discrimination" to continue with insurance companies when it comes to age, disability, sexual orientation, country of birth etc etc etc but absolutely not on sex? Where is the logic in that?

I don't think insurance companies particularly favour women over men once they are over 25. If you lived round here you would see why young men have higher insurance .

Shileas Wheels quoted me cheaper insurance with my husband on as a named driver than with me on my own. I have had a clean license my whole life and have no claims. he has speeding points and claims for malicious damage. Explain that please someone?

@suchprospects, I entirely agree. If we accept the principle that sex discrimination is ok if backed by statistical correlation then that might take us to some uncomfortable places.

I was beginning to think I was going mad.

@ScramVonChubby, Apologies for being a bit spiky in my last comment.

Ok so you don't like my turn of phrase. It wasn't intended to offend, but I make no appologies if it did.

I'd rather nobody had to "mitigate their gender" whatever the hell you mean by that or however easy you think it might be.

I have to agree with Jeanine here. Correlation is not causation and women will generally be worse off when companies are allowed to act otherwise.

I was an actuarial assistant for a short while straight out of university (so sometime ago). At least back then, the gender discrimination in the insurance industry was not generally in women's favour.

' the guy driving the car may have driven like a cock, but his biology did not actually cause the accident.'

Should we be using gender led hate terms on this thread? Would we accept twats I wonder, or would prat / idiot / suicidal maniac suffice?

If more guys drive like idiots then women, it's a sensible reason for insurance companies to use. It is not syaing 'oooh we like women, come sit here in your pwetty leetle frock and bat your eyelids of fragrant madame'- it is saying 'men are more likely to cost us cash to it is ONE of the risk groups we idnetify'.

Gender is something that IS easily mitigated by safe driving, not acquiring point,s buying a mslaler car: it is far from a defining feature.

I ahve only boys, and doubt I will be able to pay for them to drive whilst they (I say they, I have no ideas whether ds1 will eb allowed to drive or not and ds3 definitely not) are dependent on me, but I don't think that's sexism: just the fact that statistically as a group they are a worse bet.

But your health status does have a causal effect on things like life expectancy. If you have diabetes, it's quite likely to cause your death, so it's going to affect your life insurance.

The difference between men and women in insurance claim statistics show a correlation, but nobody ever said after an accident that it was caused by the presence of a penis in the driving seat. OK, so not literally anyway - the guy driving the car may have driven like a cock, but his biology did not actually cause the accident.

Millag and car size are all part of the risk model anyway.

If insurers can't use sex, they can always look for some other proxy for risky behaviour. Regulatory disruption presents an opportunity for individual insurers as well as a cost.