Updated Warning: It's Still a Bad Idea to buy property in Florida

[sierra_nevada]

In July 2007, I warned my faithful readers against buying property in Florida because the entire state had decided to be irrational about property insurance premiums (legislate them to be too low) and the very real risk of hurricanes. About a month later, The Economist echoed my concerns in an article appropriately entitled "Wishing the Wind not to

Comments

[unixronin]

There will always be people who think they can write a law that allows them to get something for nothing, and fully expect it to work. They invariably end up shocked, shocked I tell you!, when it turns not not to work that way. And of course, it's always someone else's fault.

[gizbot]

Why the price supports in the first place? Usually, the government runs price supports for extreme elasticity goods. In agriculture, a bumper crop can cause massive industry failure as the total value of all goods sold decreases with extra production. Some price supports keep the world from exploding.

Price supports on insurance make little sense. I could see the government mandating standardized contract clauses if fraud and opportunism were running the day.

So, why did they do the stupid this time?

[sierra_nevada]

The People cried, "it's too expensive! Make it cheaper!" and the politicians didn't say "No" as they should have.

As for price supports, that's what the commodity futures markets are for - they provide price predictability for farmers on a seasonal basis, which transfers the risk.