Auto Insurers' Marriage Discount Faces Scrutiny

[mahatmakanejeeves]

I'm clearing out old stuff.

Auto Insurers' Marriage Discount Faces Scrutiny

Gay-Rights Advocates and Others Push States to Consider Whether Exclusion of Others Is Fair

By Leslie Scism
Feb. 10, 2014 7:49 p.m. ET

Are married people better drivers? Insurance companies think so, and most have long charged married drivers less than single ones, which can amount to hundreds of dollars a year in savings.

Now same-sex couples, gay-rights advocates and a new federal agency are pushing states to take a closer look at the appropriateness of discounts enjoyed by married heterosexual couples but not gay ones. The practice can also disadvantage longtime unmarried heterosexual couples, as well as divorced people and widows and widowers.

Many insurers do offer the price breaks to gay couples in states that allow same-sex marriages or other civil unions, according to trade groups and other industry executives. But with about 30 states not recognizing gay unions of any sort, that means the cost savings aren't available to same-sex couples across most of the U.S.

"Fundamentally, it's a question of fairness," said Michael McRaith, director of the Federal Insurance Office, which was created by the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial-regulation law, in testimony before a House subcommittee on insurance last week. He noted that the impact on an auto policy's price can be 4% to 20%.
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Write to Leslie Scism at [e-mail]

Addison Rose, left, and Todd Markham cut their car-insurance bill after they got married during Utah's brief window allowing gay marriages. Mr. Markham says 'it's irritating' to think of the lost savings through the years. Kim Raff for The Wall Street Journal

[Politicalboi]

1. And what about us singles?

Why do we have to pay more because we never got married?

[mahatmakanejeeves]

2. "Why do we have to pay more because we never got married?"

"Are married people better drivers? Insurance companies think so,..."