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Last updated on May 20th, 2017 at 07:29 am
Insurance companies have lately sought to cash in on climate hysteria:
Many coastal property owners in North Carolina have seen their insurance rates increase 25 percent since May …
“I know everybody on the coast is suffering from high insurance rates,” said William Baggett, an owner of the oceanfront Blockade Runner hotel in Wrightsville Beach. He said his rates have quadrupled since 2005. “I don’t think they are quite justified.”
That report from last year. But things have since turned around:
Lloyd’s of London warned yesterday that an absence last year of natural disasters or man-made accidents was putting pressure on firms to reduce premiums in 2008.
The world’s oldest and biggest insurance market said that though the lack of major disasters had allowed firms to push up profits 5% in 2007, underwriting margins were being squeezed … two years of relatively few claims for environmental damage have increased competition in the sector.
Via Norway’s prime blogger VamPus (“I don’t see money as the root of all evil, I see work, ambitions and talent as the root of the money”), who curtly remarks:
Knis.
Yumpin’ yimminy! Dat Heidi Nordby Lunde (VamPus) is vun preety gurl! Vhy, her eyes remind me of de Sognefjord dat time venn I was a young man in de ald country and fell off a herring boat. An’ I see dat her civil status is : “Singel, med katt.” Yew single fellers out dere could do a whole lot vurse, by golly!
I’m glad she doesn’t see money as the root of all evil.
Pedants and fact checkers, know the provenance of that phrase as 1 Timothy 6:8-10 in the New Testament.
In Greek:
ἔχοντες δὲ διατροφὰς σκεπάσματα τούτοις ἀρκεσθησόμεθα δὲ βουλόμενοι ἐμπίπτουσιν εἰς πειρασμὸν παγίδα καὶ ἐπιθυμίας πολλὰς ἀνοήτους καὶ βλαβεράς αἵτινες βυθίζουσιν τοὺς ἀνθρώπους εἰς ὄλεθρον καὶ ἀπώλειαν ῥίζα γὰρ πάντων τῶν κακῶν ἐστιν ἡ φιλαργυρία ἧς τινες ὀρεγόμενοι ἀπεπλανήθησαν ἀπὸ τῆς πίστεως καὶ ἑαυτοὺς περιέπειραν ὀδύναις πολλαῖς
A translation (Hobbins):
. . . so if we have food and clothing, let us be content with that. But those who long to be rich fall into temptation and into a trap and into many senseless and harmful desires which plunge people into ruin and destruction. The root of all evil is the love of money, in pursuit of which some have wandered from the faith and spiked themselves on many a painful thorn.
They can also spot the difference.
Including the left-wing and/or socialist parties of every Western democracy.
Posted by Spiny Norman on 2008 04 04 at 04:11 PM • permalink
Since I used to be in the disaster recovery business, might I point out that since Katrina there hasn’t been squat for my old pals to do. Since many of them are independent contractors who only get work when there’s work to do, most of them have moved on to other lines.
To add an insult to this problem, FEMA has reacted in typical knee-jerk fashion since Katrina, and increased the scope of work for inspectors which has, naturally, made the work more time consuming and less profitable.
So, basically, the entire cadre of experienced inspectors is no longer available, and many wouldn’t return to the work now because it isn’t the same job with the same profit potential anymore. Even those who did return would have to be retrained.
If there was a huge disaster now, like a 9.0 earthquake in San Francisco, for example, it would be yet another massive cluster-fuck.
I don’t know how many times I’ve heard my old buds say to me, “You got out at just the right time” or something similar.
Mark my words, unless there is a run-up of small disasters to rebuild the cadre of inspectors again, the next “big one” will be far worse than Katrina was. With katrina, the FEMA contractors had a huge cadre of experienced inspectors, and it was still a massive pile of shit.
Actually, there is no definite article before “root” in the Greek text; “the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil” is an equally valid translation. (Don’t argue with me; I know a little Greek)
Posted by AlburyShifton on 2008 04 04 at 05:01 PM • permalink
- I know a little Greek
His name’s Stavros and he owns the fruit shop down the road. Ta-daa!I did a quick Google search for ‘knis’ but couldn’t get a translation – any ideas? I get the sense that it comes out as a contemptuous snort.Posted by SwinishCapitalist on 2008 04 04 at 06:50 PM • permalink
“OMIGOD! We’re not all going to die! This is really going to cost us!”
Posted by richard mcenroe on 2008 04 04 at 07:26 PM • permalink
#9—I’m up for an evil root, if my back holds out.
“I ain’t as good as I was once,
But I’m as good once as I ever was…” –Toby KeithPosted by richard mcenroe on 2008 04 04 at 07:28 PM • permalink
root, number multiplied by itself sounds like insurance, they actuary do not know.
Posted by stackja1945 on 2008 04 04 at 08:24 PM • permalink
The correct way to look at, “the love of money is a/the root of all (kinds of) evil” is to understand that the love of money is a form of covetousness.
There is a reason that the Commands of God begin with, “I am the Lord your God” and end with, “You shall not covet anything that is your neighbor’s”: – it’s like a top-down, or God’s Eye, view of the metaphorical Three of the Knowledge of Good and Evil – the end result of all sin is Godlessness, and the beginning of all sin is covetousness (Or lust, envy, jealousy). It is the unholy desire that is the true root of all evil, and that leads to all of the other sins listed in the Commands of God. The love of money is just one of the major players, so to speak.
Which is why, by the way, that Jesus was able to summarize the Commands of God as, “Love your neighbor as you love yourself”: If you do that, you won’t seduce your neighbor’s wife, you won’t steal from him, or kill him, &c.
Which is why, by the way, that Jesus was able to summarize the Commands of God as, “Love your neighbor as you love yourself”: If you do that, you won’t seduce your neighbor’s wife, you won’t steal from him, or kill him, &c.
Akin to: ‘do unto others …’
Methinks the downward spiral commences when a narcissistic person sees (others) as inferior, thus not worthy of the treatment they expect of themselves: ‘some pigs are more equal’
Mark my words, unless there is a run-up of small disasters to rebuild the cadre of inspectors again, the next “big one” will be far worse than Katrina was. With katrina, the FEMA contractors had a huge cadre of experienced inspectors, and it was still a massive pile of shit.
Hucbald, without going into a long boring rant, I will merely endorse your conclusion. Spot on, dude.
Posted by The_Real_JeffS on 2008 04 05 at 09:50 AM • permalink
I reckon this will be spun by insurance companies and regulators thus:
“Reserves must be built up against disasters just around the corner, when Glowbull Warmenatization really, really does come true.”