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> who in the future may be able to discriminate against you due to your genetic characteristics. Look, I know it's fashionable to disavow discrimination in all

> who in the future may be able to discriminate against you due to your genetic characteristics. Look, I know it's fashionable to disavow discrimination in all its forms and for all its reasons, but businesses built on evaluating risk, like insurance companies, NEED to discriminate. It's impossible to price and discount risk without access to accurate information. I'd be FAR FAR more worried about governments misusing my genetic data than insurance companies using it to determine an accurate risk profile.

maxerickson 9y ago
The insurance company can price risk at the population level, there is no need for it to be able to price it individually. This can be "less fair" to the lower risk members of the population, but the other side of that is whether the insurance company is actually capable of doing the individual pricing in a fair way, or if it is just being presumptuous.
- scarhill 9y ago
  The problem is adverse selection. If insurance buyers have information that insurance sellers aren't allowed to have or act on, high risk people will buy, while low-risk people won't. As losses go up, so will the price and when the price goes so high that only the highest risk people will buy, the market will collapse.
dibujante 9y ago
Giving insurance companies more information simply reduces the scope of what they will insure. Highly predictable risk (I will be dead before I turn 150) is not really insurable. Unpredictable risk (I will be struck by lightning) is. Genetic screening just moves some unpredictables to the predictable column. Is it fair? No clue. If it turns out that there's a genetic predisposition to being struck by lightning that modern genetic testing uncovers, then all those "struck by lightning" policies will die - they were subsidizing the highly conductive to the detriment of the non-conductive. Hope you're not highly conductive!
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maxerickson 9y ago

The insurance company can price risk at the population level, there is no need for it to be able to price it individually. This can be "less fair" to the lower risk members of the population, but the other side of that is whether the insurance company is actually capable of doing the individual pricing in a fair way, or if it is just being presumptuous.

scarhill 9y ago
The problem is adverse selection. If insurance buyers have information that insurance sellers aren't allowed to have or act on, high risk people will buy, while low-risk people won't. As losses go up, so will the price and when the price goes so high that only the highest risk people will buy, the market will collapse.

dibujante 9y ago

Giving insurance companies more information simply reduces the scope of what they will insure. Highly predictable risk (I will be dead before I turn 150) is not really insurable. Unpredictable risk (I will be struck by lightning) is. Genetic screening just moves some unpredictables to the predictable column. Is it fair? No clue. If it turns out that there's a genetic predisposition to being struck by lightning that modern genetic testing uncovers, then all those "struck by lightning" policies will die - they were subsidizing the highly conductive to the detriment of the non-conductive. Hope you're not highly conductive!

deleted 9y ago

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