Random Thoughts

[Mara]

I don't know about the male/female thing, but you're both paying too damn much for insurance. Holy cats. I pay $450 every six months. $450 American. Which is a half step above monopoly money.

[Sven]

Because I'm male.

Is that fair?

The way you put it does not sound fair. But it sounds like there's likely more to it. Insurance is frequently a little bit crazy. Bad drivers pay 100, good drivers pay 200, etc. Continuity is an issue. Age is an issue. I have never heard of gender being an issue, but it would not surprise me if it plays some part, though I would assume it would be the reverse of what you are suggesting.

[megladon8]

I don't know about the male/female thing, but you're both paying too damn much for insurance. Holy cats. I pay $450 every six months. $450 American. Which is a half step above monopoly money.

Canada is ridiculous with car insurance.

If you co-sign with parents or something, you can get a bit of a break. But that's pretty much exactly what I don't want to do.

If you're a middle-class male under the age of 30, you pay up the ass.

There are also rules according to the type of car you drive. If your car is red, you pay more, whereas if your car is yellow, you pay less. If your car is 2-door, you pay more than a 4-door. If your car is considered a "sports car" or a truck, you pay more.

Which is why I don't appreciate that my sister drives a red 2-door sports car and pays less than half of what I would have to pay if I just want to drive an old sedan or something.


I'm starting to think that this whole getting my license thing is a waste of time. I'll never be able to afford insurance, let alone the gas and upkeep on top of it.

[megladon8]

The way you put it does not sound fair. But it sounds like there's likely more to it. Insurance is frequently a little bit crazy. Bad drivers pay 100, good drivers pay 200, etc. Continuity is an issue. Age is an issue. I have never heard of gender being an issue, but it would not surprise me if it plays some part, though I would assume it would be the reverse of what you are suggesting.

No, women pay less here. Particularly young women.

A 16 year old female applying for car insurance will be quoted nearly half as much as a male of the same age, background and grade range.

Yes, they look at your school grades to determine your car insurance.

[Scar]

I remember when I was a young lad, if I got good grades, I got a break on my car insurance.

[monolith94]

Do you have a driving history, Meg?

[megladon8]

Do you have a driving history, Meg?

No, I'm just getting my license now.

[Spinal]

A quick google search tells me that males are much more likely to get into serious car accidents than females. There is your answer.

[megladon8]

Yes, I'm aware of the statistics.

I still don't think that's fair.

[Scar]

Most car rental places charge an additional fee if a male under 25 rents the car.

[megladon8]

Statistically speaking, Natives are involved in twice as many fatal car crashes as any other ethnicity, but they don't have to pay extra insurance because they're Native. That would be racism.

So why is this OK?

[Spinal]

So your feeling is that all people should pay the same rate until they prove themselves to be bad drivers?

[Dead & Messed Up]

It's not terribly fair, but it is what it is. Guys in general are worse drivers than women. Odd, considering how many crashes are the result of that time of the month...

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ritch:

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[megladon8]

So your feeling is that all people should pay the same rate until they prove themselves to be bad drivers?

Pretty much, yes.

[Derek]

Check out this awesomely entitled e-mail from a potential intern. I kind of want to hunt that person down and slap them.

Yiiikes.

I would have responded that his grammatical error in the first e-mail ("I had a quick questions about...") showed that he clearly lacked the professionalism and intellectual capacity required to serve coffee and file papers in our office and that all efforts to respond to his initial e-mail were currently redirected towards securing a paper filer who knows how to use fucking adjectives.

[Derek]

Pretty much, yes.

I think people with no driving experience should pay higher insurance rates than those with lots of driving experience and few/no mistakes.

[EyesWideOpen]

Women make 78 cents for every dollar a man makes so cheaper car insurance is our way of making reparations.

[megladon8]

I think people with no driving experience should pay higher insurance rates than those with lots of driving experience and few/no mistakes.

I would agree with this.

But gender and race should have nothing to do with it.

[transmogrifier]

$300 bucks a month?? Jesus, I pay that much a year.

[chrisnu]

So your feeling is that all people should pay the same rate until they prove themselves to be bad drivers?

I hold the exact opposite view. People should pay more until they prove they are good drivers.

[Derek]

$300 bucks a month?? Jesus, I pay that much a year.

Yeah, that's absolutely insane, then again $300/year is unimaginable in the States as well. I pay about the same as Mara, a little under $450 every 6 months.

I hold the exact opposite view. People should pay more until they prove they are good drivers.

I agree and that's pretty much how it is. My insurance has gone progressively lower over the past 7 or 8 years when I've been driving more and having no tickets/accidents.

[Mara]

Most car rental places charge an additional fee if a male under 25 rents the car.

For the few awful months I rented cars, there was a huge price jump if a driver was under 25 (either sex) and nobody could rent a car at all if they were under 21.

The car rental place where I worked was less than a mile away from Walter Reed Military Hospital and we got lots and lots of soliders renting.

One day a quiet, slender, tall young African American guy came in to rent. He had just been discharged from the hospital. He also had his grandmother with him-- she was dropping him off, but she wasn't going to be in the car. This woman was a terrifying Southern matriarch of the type I never met before I moved out here. She was wiry and gave the impression that she'd made it through hard times by sheer force of will, like a tiger. I am both delighted by and frightened of this type of woman.

Anyway, we were going through the whole rental process when I typed him his birth date from his license and found out he was two weeks shy of twenty-one. I apologized profousely and told him we would not be able to rent a car.

He said, "Oh."

His grandmother, on the other hand, threw an unholy fit. She accused me of several not-nice things, asked why he couldn't rent a car, asked me why I couldn't fudge the date of his birthday (it was because the system automatically checks with the DMV or MVA to make sure a license is valid), asked why she hadn't been told about this when she made the reservation, and on and on. I gave her our corporate complaint number and she called them from the desk phone, and yelled at them, too.

Finally, her grandson said, "I'll just take a bus. Let's go."

The grandma said, "Hold on, one more thing. Do you know where we're coming from, young lady? Walter Reed. We were at Walter Reed because my boy almost died in Iraq. Now, can you tell me why my boy is old enough to die for his country, and not old enough to rent a car? Is that fair?"

And I said, "No, ma'am, that is profoundly unfair."

To this day, I can't think of any customer or client that cussed me out that I agreed with more.

[Spinal]

Man, Mara. Sometimes your posts rise to the level of literature.

[Mara]

Man, Mara. Sometimes your posts rise to the level of literature.

Um, wow. Thanks.

[monolith94]

No, I'm just getting my license now.

That's part of the problem. I think it's probably like this in Canada, but I'm pretty sure that here, for every few years I'm on the road and I don't have an incident, my rates go down. And I've been driving for almost ten years now with no accidents, not even a speeding ticket, so that helps despite the fact that I'm twenty-six and a dude.