A Discount For Seniors?

By Author: Marcus Stalder
Total Articles: 491
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Despite Johnny Depp appearing in a film and finding the fountain of youth thanks to the help of some mermaids, there's no sign of a miracle in the real world. We all grow old and, despite all the efforts of the medical profession to make the outside appear less wrinkled, the inside bits start to wear out. Most importantly, our eyesight gets less sharp and our reflexes slow. What's automatic to a 20-year old who's just seen The Fast and the Furious, swerving in and out of traffic, avoiding crashes by a hair's breadth, is an invitation to the ER for any senior. We all have to come to terms with our age and learning defensive driving is a sensible investment, often rewarded by a discount.

Keeping this real, we all need our cars. While working, we commute. Over the weekends, we go to the mall and fill up the trunk with enough food to keep us supplied for the next seven days. Why drive? Because in almost all cities, public transport is a joke. Only the desperate wait for a bus and our train services between cities are an international joke. Without private transport, we can't get around and do the stuff we need to survive. ...
... This doesn't change when we get old. For the first decades of the last century, there was no problem. There was not much traffic and older people either died or were like Miss Daisy and rich enough to pay a driver. But as we got into the 1950s, car ownership expanded and life expectancy began to rise. Now both sexes have a reasonable expectation of living into their 80s, and everyone has at least one car (families often have a small fleet). This is creating an interesting social problem.

If you check out the statistics, you'll find that drivers in the range 65 to 74 have the lowest accident rate. They all know they could become dangerous so they slow down and take exaggerated care. Driving off-peak helps as well. But once people cross into older age, their accident rate rises sharply and starts to rival the youngest drivers with the least experience. Why worry? Because states like Massachusetts have mandated insurers to give all drivers over the age of 65 a discount of 25%. This raises the big question of the day. Do people deserve a discount just because they get old? There's a very good argument for mandatory testing of seniors to make sure they are safe. That would give us a base to start valuing their premium rates. In a recent survey, younger drivers thought seniors should be treated like every other driver. That means the good drivers are rewarded when their auto insurance quotes arrive. But the bad drivers find their premiums rising fast if they start crashing into other vehicles. Here's the second question. If we find some older drivers are not safe, do we want to order them off the road? We might think it alright to raise their auto insurance premium rates. If they cannot afford to pay out of their limited pension income, they will just stop voluntarily, right? Or perhaps they will just drive uninsured, knowing no court is likely to send them to jail.

For other highly informative insights on numerous topics from Marcus Stalder visit http://www.searchinsurers.net/auto-insurance-and-seniors.html. Marcus Stalder is a professional journalist with 15 years of experience delivering news to the public.