Should Health Insurance Cost More for Women?
The practice of charging women more than men for health insurance is not allowed in the realm of group health insurance policies. However, this restriction does not apply to individual policies. Policies sold in the individual marketplace have traditionally cost as much as 26% more for women in California than for men, even when there is no maternity coverage involved. Insurance companies defend the practice by saying that women more often use their health insurance and so should be charged more. Legislators, however, argue that such gender biases are illegal in employment and housing, and should be also in health insurance. The insurance companies warn that eliminating the practice of charging women higher premiums could raise costs for everyone across the board, however California is proceeding with anti-discriminatory legislation. Which side of the debate do you stand on?
May 13th, 2009 at 12:11 pm
Are we to see age discrimination too. Housing and employment are not driven by actuarial tables and are not a risk delimited issue.
May 13th, 2009 at 1:39 pm
Bud nailed it, housing and employment are comparing apples to oranges. Insurance companies are reliant on actuarial tables based on probability of claims. Furthermore, it would be unfair to charge someone else more premium who is a lower claim risk. There is a word for this, socialism.