Some of these awards, at least on the surface, appear to be ways for lawyers to make money

One of the biggest problems that the United States economy has is this continuing rise in litigation costs. Our policy may say, "We don't cover this type of loss," and the judge might say, "Well, we think that's against public policy; so, even though the policy doesn't cover it, we're going to make you pay it anyway," which makes it difficult. Courtroom activity also continues to shift the insurance landscape through what I call an "activist judiciary." Litigation costs will continue to increase, and that will make insurance more expensive, not less expensive. In the early days of the industry, it was a matter of ship owners arranging to each carry a portion of each other's cargo so that if one ship sank, a portion of the cargo owned by each ship owner would still be safe. The purpose of insurance is to spread the exposure of a person or corporation among many through a common entity. As the investment climate changes over the year, when investments go up or down, and you can look at the interest rates as a barometer for that, it changes the profitability index for the industry, because so much of their money gets invested in those kinds of instruments.

The other external factor that has changed the industry is the change in the investment climate. If there was one thing I could change, it would be to get real live tort reform so you wouldn't have lawsuits that are either frivolous or force you to pay out much more than you really should pay from a damage standpoint.

It has a direct impact on the insurance industry, because we have to end up paying those claims, but it has an impact on the American economy in general. I think the issue of personal responsibility and taking responsibility for your own actions, rather than trying to blame them on somebody else, has become a societal problem for the United States that will make the country less and less competitive, vis-a-vis some of the other developing countries in the world that don't have the same kind of mentality that we do. You can see it in the medical malpractice field, where you have doctors walking off the job because they can no longer afford to buy their malpractice insurance.

If you should ask your agent if a liability	Look at the premium and you can	Pricing a premium is one basic process for
The customer and that that the policy	And when they have a claim, they	Profitability is the biggest thing I
Insurance companies try to mitigate those	How you go about getting new customers	Marketing is obviously important
It's a combination of a lot of bad things	Terrorism has a different set of parameters	Some of these awards, at least on
There are three major types of companies	P&C insurers include State Farm	The three biggest risks insurance companies
The appearance of the injured person will	In this way, an insurer has about three	In most jurisdictions, rate and form
Governments are becoming more involved	The idea was really to spread the