this post was submitted on 20 Jul 2023
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Politics
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There hasn't been a natural disaster that permanently destroyed an area.
One thing that Florida does well is disaster response; you don't see the outright collapse of Florida communities like with what happened after Katrina in New Orleans. After that, communities generally get rebuilt quickly through both legal and extralegal means.
The big problem now is that the State of Florida is increasingly becoming the only home insurer for large parts of the state. The doom would likely come if a hurricane causes the state to go bankrupt.
Well according to Washington Post, they havent even finished the last hurricane; and this season is really going to pound flordia, honestly might not even be a state soon https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2023/07/17/florida-heat-wave-hurricane-ian-survivors/?wpisrc=nl_most
But the communities stayed or were able to come back relatively quickly. So people stayed, because they believe their communities will be rebuilt so it is worth it to stay.
That can start to change in a bad hurricane season, but there is still hope.
It can also change when you scare off a large part the construction workforce
The problem isn’t that things get “permanently” destroyed, but that we let people keep re-building where there is only a matter of time before it gets taken out again.
Some places have higher risks, others have guarantees of outcome, the only unknown is the timeframe.
I recall a case from Norway where someone’s house was taken by what was deemed a “100-year” flood, ie. it’s only that large every 100 years.
The insurance company and the government was happy to have them rebuild in the same location only for it to be taken out by the next event 5-10 years later.
That’s not viable for anyone. Risk to life, and the cost to the society.
The house I grew up in is over 200 years old, and has been where it’s at for more than 130 years now.
It’s survived at least 10 hurricanes, and will likely stand there for another 100 years unless someone decides to tear it down or the water level rises too much. But at least it’s a good 20 meters above sea level.
It isn't going to be politically popular for a community to support not rebuilding in case of a natural disaster. That community will take political measures to engage in self preservation.
The insurance market is leaving Florida and the government is stepping in.
“the right thing to do” is often not politically popular.
The problem is that it’s often really hard to measure what the right thing to do even was. Ie. in retrospect. Even more difficult up front.
Insurance is usually problematic too, in such matters. Your house insurance pays for a new house, in the same location. “Same” house.
Usually needs to be fairly exceptional to get something else.
So, if you wanted to get out of Dodge you’re still stuck with the same house, might not afford selling and relocating.
And even if you did you need a job. So might your spouse.
So far some of the observable effects of climate change is more frequent and stronger hurricanes and tornados.
While it’s obviously not popular, I believe we need to start taking relocating the most vulnerable areas. Some people have already relocated, others will. There are those that never will, but in-between there’s a lot of people who’ll probably suffer greatly if is not arranged before it’s “too late”.
Insurance companies pulling out is like rats leaving a sinking ship. It should be an alarming warning sign when insurance is no longer a viable business.
Obviously they would stay in the market if it was financially viable. Doesn’t matter if the margin is low, 1% of something is more than 100% of nothing.
It might still be on the plus-side today, but a sinking ship is also still floating.
I didn't make the statement to argue their point, but to explain the politics.