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$1,000 OR MORE MAKES IT YOUR
FAULT
By Chuck Wells
As you know, if you have a car
accident, your insurance company always thinks it’s your fault
so it can raise your rates because they are money-hungry
vultures just out to get all of us.
Well, maybe you should know the rules so you can fight that rate
increase.
If you have an accident and your company pays out $1,000 or more
for property damage (to fix your car or the car of someone you
just hit), you are considered at-fault in the accident and your
rates can go up for the next 3 years. If your company goes after
the insurance company of the other party in your accident and
they collect, your rates should not go up. You should argue the
surcharge and if you have a local agent (you didn’t go through
one of those 800 number outfits, did you?), ask the agent to
help you.
From 1982 to 1985, the amount of damages necessary to be paid
out in order for your rates to go up were only $400. New York
State then raised that amount to $600 in 1985 and then to a
$1,000 in 1991. It has been 12 years since New York raised that
threshold. Double the length of time they have raised it in the
past to keep up with inflation. I guess our legislators have
been too busy working on the state budget and cell phone laws to
tackle this.
If you have had any body work (on your car) done lately, you
know that a $1,000 doesn’t go very far. It is ludicrous to still
increase a person’s car insurance rates based upon such a low
amount to be paid out. There is a proposal being initiated by
insurance agents to increase that threshold to $2,000. I doubt
that insurance companies will be in favor of the proposal. Any
idea why?
THE WORST JOBS IN SCIENCE
Popular Science magazine has come out with the worst jobs to
have in science. Now, I never did well with science courses in
school and I really disliked math too. Sports and lunch were ok.
Anyway, here are some science jobs to avoid unless you are a
complete nerd: Counting fish one by one which swim by dams in
the Pacific Northwest. Reaching in to a cow’s stomach and
pulling out its contents to be analyzed. Catching mosquitoes and
being bitten 15 times a minute to see if you will get malaria.
YOU ARE NOT A FAILURE
We just hate it when someone is a failure. No one should be a
loser in this country as it will give them low self-esteem and
they will go out and sue someone else for their mistakes. Well,
a high school in Beaufort County, South Carolina, adopted a new
policy for two-semester courses. This policy states that a
student who fails the first semester of a course will
automatically get a 62 no matter what their actual grade. They
call it an “encouraging 62.” I call it encouraging losers.
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