this post was submitted on 11 Sep 2023
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It means we need to start seriously talking about risk mitigation.
If you’re in a fire area, you need to pay for forest debris clearing and removal of trees from near structures.
If you’re in a hurricane area, your residence will need to be built to certain standards to resist flooding and wind damage.
We already had reforms to building codes in regard to earthquake preparedness about a century ago.
Yeah but for fire specifically, its not just what you do or how you build that matters. It pretty different than other perils because risk is emergent of individual management paradigms. For example, this guy got non-renewed because of debris stored under his eves and around the structure.
When this happened, I pointed out that his management of his property was precisely why he was being non-renewed, and the comments came back extremely defensive about how he was managing his space. The commenters didn't seen anything wrong with how he was managing his space; I saw everything wrong about how he was managing the space. Granted it was hackernews so it was more of a libertarian response, as in "He should be allowed to do what he wants in his space". Sure. But realize that puts him at risk, and more importantly, it puts his entire community at greater risk of a catastrophic loss.
I think people are woefully underestimating the risk they face and completely failing to recognize the role the take in creating that risk. People don't want to hear it, but it is quite literally in their hands.
I’m not sure I understand how that’s a different paradigm from earthquake preparedness, like to be ready for an earthquake you have to build and maintain your structure in a certain way. That guy in your example failed the “maintain” part of that, seems like it should be treated the same.
Also no shit you shouldn’t pile flammable material next to your house in a fire zone, seems pretty intuitive. Plus all that guy needs to do to get covered again is to move the debris. Seems like a case of being intentionally obtuse to prove some individualist point, hilariously and ironically undermined since he’s seeking the collectivist protection of insurance in the first place.
Its different in that how well risky my neighbor down the block is for an earthquake does not impact my earthquake risk.
Fire is fundamentally different than flood or earthquake as a peril because what people around you do to mitigate or prepare fundamentally impacts your risk.
If my neighbor has put their house up on stilts to mitigate for flooding, this doesn't change my flood risk. If my neighbor has managed their property in a way that reduces their fire risk, it also reduces my fire risk (and of course if they fail to do so, the opposite is true as well).
Aha gotcha great point.
It’s kind of like how car insurance varies based on where you live, because your neighbors may have more expensive cars and they don’t want to pay for when you crash into those.
Then maybe fire preparedness isn’t something “the market” can handle, and we just need realistic enforcement of construction and maintenance rules.