PARSIPPANY — The pandemic changed our lives forever in many ways. Throughout the past year, we’ve had to deal with a lot of loss and loneliness. Many have had to deal with job loss and financial issues. However, when not focusing on the pain, there is a lot we can learn about our civilization and society.
One of the fascinating things about the pandemic is how it has impacted industries that are usually quite predictable. The housing industry is one such example. While housing prices work on quite a direct supply/demand basis, it has been near impossible to predict which factors would make houses available and encourage people to buy. Thus, housing markets expected to crash have actually flourished.
Another industry that has proven incredibly complicated is the insurance industry. When it comes to pricing premiums, insurance is usually predictable. Increased risks mean increased premiums. But despite risk having increased dramatically in a number of areas, no types of insurance have seen the correlation you’d normally expect.
Let’s take a look at insurance prices in Parsippany to get an idea of why this is.
Life Insurance in Parsippany
Life insurance is a fascinating place to start. Obviously, the pandemic has increased the risk of death by quite a lot. This increased risk is unlikely to disappear altogether along with the pandemic. After all, thousands of more people are now suffering from chronic lung illnesses.
If insurance companies were dealing with a handful of people with increased risks, they would simply hike those individuals’ premiums. However, the risk has increased throughout Parsippany and the United States.
Hiking the premiums of every single Parsippany resident according to the extent of the risk would have been a form of self-sabotage for the industry. The reality is that many life insurance policies have lapsed due to loss of income and increased health expenses. While this does benefit the life insurance industry to an extent, as they won’t have to pay out those policies, the loss far outweighs it.
Insurance companies have therefore had to be careful with premium increases, as they cannot afford to lose more customers. Furthermore, they’ve had to pay out more insurance claims due to the pandemic, and are scrambling to make up ground. All of these factors have served to keep life insurance prices in Parsippany somewhat stable.
But what about health insurance?
Health Insurance in New Jersey
The health insurance industry has faced similar battles. They have had to pay out a lot of claims due to the pandemic. Many policies have lapsed due to loss of income and loss of jobs (especially for those companies that rely on policies sold to employers). Furthermore, the increased risk of illness on the horizon for the foreseeable future puts the industry at risk of a neverending increase in claims.
They cannot simply hike premiums to cover the risk, as that would only lead to more individuals having to let go of their health insurance. The general public is simply not solvent enough at the moment to ask too much more, even if there is an increased need for health insurance.
For these reasons, health insurance in NJ and Parsippany has remained as affordable (or unaffordable) as before the pandemic. That’s unlikely to change in the near future, but health insurance companies are sure to find a way to take advantage of consumers without losing their patronage.
Homeowners and Renters Insurance in New Jersey
One type of insurance that has mostly avoided the trials and tribulations of COVID-19 is homeowners and renters insurance in NJ. While it is true that customers have been lost to the virus and policies have lapsed due to the financial consequences of the pandemic, the need for property insurance and the risks have not changed much.
Homeowners insurance, in particular, has stayed stable, with very few homeowners willing to risk leaving their homes uninsured, even when they are battling financially. Renters insurance, which covers a renter’s possessions, is less of a sure thing. After all, many renters are battling against eviction, and paying rent is more of a priority than paying for insurance.
Renters insurance in Parsippany has therefore remained at the same prices (and even dropped in some cases). There is no increased risk due to the pandemic, but it is more difficult to pay for.
The insurance industry is usually fairly easy to predict, but the impact of the pandemic has changed that. Now, it remains to be seen how insurance companies will deal with the risks once the country has recovered financially.
