Independent Women’s Forum | May 12, 2012
Cost “discrimination” in health insurance is not sexist. It is an actuarial reality that women are more expensive health consumers. For health insurance companies to acturately assign our risk, gender is a factor. It’s the same thing in reverse for auto insurance. Women (jokes aside) are safer drivers than men and file less expensive auto claims. This means that women, in general, pay lower auto insurance premiums. Women shouldn’t have to subsidize the risky driving behaviors of men, and men shouldn’t have to subsidize the health care decisions of women. However, many men do help pay for the care of their wives, mothers, sisters, and daughters. They do this because they pay for health care as a family unit. And many a mother has paid her 16-year-old’s son’s auto insurance bill. Insurance is a risk-based industry, not a tool of the patriarchy to seek out and punish females.
