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I was recently wondering how the insurance industry will respond to self-driving cars. When self-driving vehicles are a small percentage of the market, it helps
by ohitsdom 11y ago
I was recently wondering how the insurance industry will respond to self-driving cars. When self-driving vehicles are a small percentage of the market, it helps reduce their claims. When the entire grid is self-driving, the industry will be much smaller. We're probably at least 40 years away from that, but it still should happen someday.
- toomuchtodo 11y agoThe insurance industry would disappear. If you own and manage your own self-driving vehicle fleet, you're going to self-insure. https://usinsuranceagents.com/answers/3251/what-is-self-insured-car-insurance https://usinsuranceagents.com/answers/3251/what-is-self-insu...
- fweespeech 11y agoMany people, particularly in rural areas, are still going to want private cars. They will get insurance. Leasing capacity with little delay will only work in regions with dense population.
- icebraining 11y agoWhy do they need insurance? Poorly maintained cars will probably just refuse to go, so any flaws will be either deliberate tampering (which most insurances already don't cover, AFAIK) or the fault of the manufacturer.
- fweespeech 11y agoNo system is fault proof and I doubt we will ever surrender the ability to manually override the system.
- icebraining 11y agoMaybe, but will any company be willing to insure the case when the user deliberately drives despite the car telling them not to?
- koenigdavidmj 11y agoThat covers fleets, where maintenance can be strictly done according to the manufacturer's recommended schedule. Therefore, the only remaining entity that can be liable is the manufacturer. Individually owned vehicles are not necessarily maintained to schedule. I would bet that a large percentage don't receive much attention at all, other than oil and filter, unless something goes wrong. Therefore, personal liability won't entirely go away.
- toomuchtodo 11y agoThe insurance I speak of is liability and property damage. Its not related to maintenance.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- koenigdavidmj 11y agoFor a self-driving car, programmed to follow traffic laws to the letter, an at-fault collision indicates a problem with the vehicle, either caused by a manufacturer defect (which includes software bugs) or by maintenance negligence by the owner. If an owner of a vehicle maintains it to the recommendations of the manufacturer, then any breakdowns also become manufacturer defects. If a company owns a fleet of vehicles, and maintains them according to the manufacturer's recommendations, it is now impossible for them to be liable. A collision is always either the fault of the manufacturer or of another vehicle. Therefore, the owner of the vehicles need not have insurance. (This is not the current legal situation, but I expect that it would be in a few years.) An individual person who owns a self-driving car would have exactly the same situation as above, provided they maintain the car to the recommended standard. In an attempt to deny a claim, the manufacturer would have the ability to argue that the vehicle was not maintained to standard, in which case the person would be liable for the results of that negligence.
- ams6110 11y agoRandom failures will still occur, even if the vehicle is properly maintained and through no inherent flaw in the vehicle. No system is perfect.
- true_religion 11y agoIt'd seem the insurance rates would eventually be standardized to per car & driving technology; rather than taking into account any factors about the driver.
- Moshe_Silnorin 11y ago>We're probably at least 40 years away. That seems way too pessimistic.
- pc86 11y agoThe important text there was "the entire grid." Meaning the numbers of cars is sufficiently small we can assume it to be 0.