Insurance against natural catastrophes: balancing actuarial fairness and social solidarity

Arthur Charpentier (), Laurence Barry and Molly James
Additional contact information
Arthur Charpentier: UQAM - Université du Québec à Montréal = University of Québec in Montréal
Laurence Barry: Chaire PARI (Palaiseau)
Molly James: UBO - Université de Brest

Post-Print from HAL

Abstract: Natural disasters offer a specific case study of the mix of public and private insurance. Indeed, the experience accumulated over the past decades has made it possible to transform poorly-known hazards like flood losses, long considered uninsurable, into risks that can be assessed with some precision. They exemplify, however, the affordability issue associated with risk-based premiums. The French scheme reflects such ideas and offers wide coverage for moderate premiums to all, but is questioned in its principle by climate change: we show that some wealthier areas that were not perceived as ‘at risk' in the past have now become exposed to submersion risk. This singularly makes some well-off properties the potential main beneficiaries of a scheme that was historically thought to protect the worst-off. Acknowledging that some segmentation may become desirable, we examine several models for flood risk and the disparity in premiums they entail.

Date: 2022
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Published in Geneva Papers on Risk and Insurance - Issues and Practice, 2022, 47 (1), pp.50-78. ⟨10.1057/s41288-021-00233-7⟩

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:journl:hal-05116378

DOI: 10.1057/s41288-021-00233-7

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Post-Print from HAL
Bibliographic data for series maintained by CCSD ().