From financial economists’ exuberant growth forecasts early in the year to central bankers’ coining of the term “transitory” inflation to pushback against Federal Reserve “tapering”,credible economists have never diverged so widely in their economic outlooks as they have in 2021, says Dr. Michel Léonard, head of Triple-I’s Economics & Analytics department.
Michel Léonard, V.P., Sr. Economist, Data Scientist, Head of Economics and Analytics
Léonard is author of Triple-I’s fourth-quarter insurance economic outlook report,Soft Landing, Headwinds and Rebound. The quarterly report is available to Triple-I members only at economics.iii.org and is a companion publication to Triple-I’s Insurance Economics Dashboard. Non-members interested in learning about membership can contact Deena Snell.
Triple-I’s analysis translates broad economic growth drivers into business line-specific terms. So, while the insurance industry is expected to show a 3.4 percent growth rate in 2021, Léonard says, it will underperform overall U.S. GDP growth of 5.8 percent because it is “constrained by its ties to industries with growth rates significantly below and inflation rates significantly above the U.S. rates overall.”
According to the report, concerns about “runaway inflation” subsided in the second half of 2021 as prices for most goods in the consumer supply index (CPI) trended lower and overall inflation peaked at 4 percent. However, for a basket of goods whose prices tend to affect insurance claims and losses – think automobiles and replacement parts, among others – inflation remained above 10 percent. This is due primarily to supply-chain and labor-force disruptions.
As a result, the Triple-I report sees the insurance industry’s combined ratio increasing (underwriting profitability falling) due to low underlying growth and high line-specific inflation. It also sees the industry’s 2021 investment returns outpacing 2020’s, despite headwinds.
The global pandemic accelerated many technological advances that were already underway in the insurance industry – changes that are likely to pick up speed as COVID-19 recedes, according to Rohit Verma, CEO, Crawford & Co.
Triple-I CEO Sean Kevelighan recently spoke with Verma about the dramatic changes taking place as virtual interactions became more necessary and expected by consumers – especially in the early stages of the COVID-19 crisis. Crawford is a global provider of claims management solutions.
“We have a self-service app which had probably a seven to 10 percent adoption rate,” Verma said in the conversation, which you can watch in full below. “Within the first three months, that adoption rate went up from seven to 10 percent to about 35 to 40 percent.”
Verma said he expects further acceleration of digitization in insurance, with start-ups partnering with larger, established companies to transform how insurance is done. The biggest obstacle, as he sees it, is the question: “Do we approach problems with a viewpoint of how we do solve them digitally, or do we approach them on how we solve them traditionally?”
While property crime (except for car theft) has been on the decline, the United States has been experiencing a worrying surge in violent crime since the start of the pandemic.
Murder and non-negligent manslaughter rose 29.4 percent in 2020 from 2019, the biggest rise since recordkeeping began in 1960, according to F.B.I. data. The trend continued in the first half of 2021, when the number of homicides increased 16 percent from the same period in 2020 and 42 percent compared to the same period in 2019. Aggravated assault increased 9 percent, and gun assaults were up 5 percent, according to the Council on Criminal Justice.
Crime analysts have suggested several possible contributing factors, including the many strains brought on by the pandemic; a pullback in enforcement by the police; and a spike in firearm purchases.
Negligent security
When a violent crime occurs on a business or residential property, the victims often can hold the owners liable for damages stemming from “negligent security.” Negligent security cases are based on the obligation (“duty of care”) of a property owner or tenant to provide a safe environment for their customers, residents, or visitors. According to PropertyCasualty 360, such cases are a “significant and growing subset of premises liability.”
Examples of negligent security include:
Poor lighting,
Lack of security guards or guards who fail to do their job properly, and
Insufficient locks or other security devices.
The duty of care borne by property owners can vary based on the types of businesses they operate. A shopping mall with limited hours may have a lower duty of care than an assisted living facility charged with caring for vulnerable residents 24/7.
Negligent security cases incur significant investigation and settlement costs, though few make it to trial. Cases that do go to trial can get widespread media coverage, and juries, sympathetic to violent-crime victims, can hand down massive awards. In Georgia, for example, lawsuits stemming from criminal attacks in CVS and Kroger parking lots ended in verdicts of $43 million in Fulton County and $69.6 million in DeKalb County, respectively, in 2019. CVS and Kroger were held liable on the basis that they should have had more security.
Risk management
Property and business owners can prepare to demonstrate that they have taken reasonable precautions by making sure crime prevention practices are in place. Steps that can be taken include:
Have on-site security staff and make sure they follow up-to-date policies and procedures,
Make sure security equipment is up-to-date and working,
Make sure all staff is trained in security and in how to handle potentially dangerous situations,
Perform regular inspections on lighting, stairs, windows, and doors,
Maintain landscaping properly, and
Investigate all threats of criminal activity.
The role of insurance
Negligent security is part of the broader coverage of premises liability. Whether you are covered or not depends on your individual policy. If negligent security is excluded, it should plainly say so in the policy. If the policy language is ambiguous, courts may favor the policyholder in a coverage dispute.
When you’re covered, your insurance underwriting professional will work with you to make sure recognized crime prevention practices are being followed on the property. That way you will be prepared to prove that you followed reasonable precautions if a violent crime occurs.
If a violent crime does happen and a negligent security insurance claim is filed, the insurer will want to respond quickly to investigate the security measures that were in place, retain legal counsel, and engage a premises security expert. Delays in developing a defense plan can adversely affect the outcome and cost of the case. It’s important for the policyholder to have an emergency call list in the event of a crime and to have someone from the claims group on that list.
An insurance adjuster can help to resolve complex claims quickly, as well as help property owners prevent future incidents. The adjuster might dig into a property’s history to illuminate what’s considered “normal” and what activities owners should reasonably have anticipated. A history of break-ins or muggings, for example, could establish that the owner knew about the risk and, therefore, should have strengthened security measures in response, according to Engle Martin & Associates, a loss-adjustment and claims-management provider.
The adjuster may also look at the property owners’ social media and online reviews for previous complaints about security. If the owners issued warnings about criminal activity and shared their attempts to improve security, for example, that can bolster their defense, said Natalie Prescott, casualty claims manager at Engle Martin.
Taking appropriate security measures and understanding your insurance coverage will go a long way toward helping you be prepared if a violent crime happens on your property. Of course, you should seek guidance from your insurance or legal professionals about your specific circumstances.
So, what better time than now (before it’s too late!) to bust the cliché that insurance is a boring industry.
The cliché might be rooted in the idea that insurance is all about remaining cozily in some imaginary “safety zone”. Or maybe in the fact that the industry’s visual surface tends to be one of dull-looking paperwork full of fine print.
But think about it: the entire industry is rooted in risk!
Automobile accidents and other forms of property damage are only the start of it. There’s liability risk – the risk of being sued: product liability, professional liability, employment practices, directors and officers, errors and omissions, medical malpractice – the list goes on, and insurance professionals have to understand these areas of risk intimately to price policies, set aside appropriate reserves, and pay claims in a timely fashion.
Is climate-related risk keeping you up at night? You’re not alone. Insurers have been working on that one for decades, empowered by sophisticated modeling and analytics capabilities. They aren’t just worrying about extreme weather and climate – they’re partnering with other industries, communities, and governments to do something about it.
And, speaking of sophisticated technology – what about cyber risk? The average cost of a data breach rose year over year in 2021 from $3.86 million to $4.24 million, according to a recent report by IBM and the Ponemon Institute — the highest in the 17 years that this report has been published. These kinds of numbers add up quickly. Unlike flood and fire – perils for which insurers have decades of data to help them accurately measure and price policies – cyber threats are comparatively new and constantly evolving. The presence of malicious intent results in their having more in common with terrorism than with natural catastrophes.
These are just a few of the risks types insurance professionals look in the eye daily, working with a wide range of experts across industries and disciplines to meet them. From the individual and family level to businesses large and small to the global economy, insurers play a critical role as both risk-management partners and financial first responders.
Keep these things in mind next time you catch yourself stifling a yawn at the mention of insurance!
“Insurance is one of the industries I cover for CNBC, so I look forward to discussing the top issues of the day at one of its premier events,” Brewer said. “Given 2021’s extreme weather, high-profile cyberattacks, and economic volatility, insurance has been in the news constantly, so there are plenty of things to talk about.”
The 2021 JIF is being held at the New York Hilton Midtown. The in-person, daylong program, bringing together the most accomplished thinkers and leaders in insurance, will be conducted in accordance with New York City’s Covid-19 protocols.
“CNBC is a recognized world leader in business news and reaches millions of Americans across all of its platforms,” Kevelighan said, adding that he looks forward to “a robust discussion” with Brewer. The agenda also includes panels on insurance economics, insurer talent and recruitment initiatives, and the societal costs of runaway litigation.
If you didn’t quit your job this year, chances are you’re thinking about it: 41 percent of the global workforce is considering leaving their employer this year according to a Microsoft study.
U.S. workers are quitting in record numbers: 4.3 million resigned in August, nearly 3 percent of the U.S. workforce and the most in the 20 years since Department of Labor began keeping track. This followed 3.98 million resignations in July and 3.99 million in April.
While the reasons so many workers are quitting now are often related to low wages and poor working conditions, the pandemic has also led many people with “good” jobs to reevaluate the role of work in their lives and to pursue jobs that are more meaningful to them. The mass exodus has employers worried.
According to a Gartner survey of human resource leaders, 91 percent are “increasingly concerned” about employee turnover in the near future. Employee turnover costs U.S. businesses close to a trillion dollars a year, by some estimates (made before the pandemic).
What does this mean for insurers?
To shed light on how the Great Resignation is affecting the insurance industry, we turn to the Jacobson Group’s Insurance Labor Market Study conducted in third quarter of 2021 jointly with Aon. The study found that insurance professionals who were waiting to make moves earlier in the pandemic are now exploring their options and re-evaluating their positions with their current employers – a situation that makes recruiting, especially at experienced levels, “extremely competitive.”
Other key findings from the survey include:
56 percent of companies plan to increase staff during the next 12 months, driven by the life/health segment, at 73 percent;
If the industry follows through on its plans, a 1.81 percent increase in industry employment is expected during the next 12 months;
Understaffed areas and business expansion were the top two reasons cited for increasing staff;
Technology is the area most likely to increase staff for large companies, followed by sales/marketing and underwriting;
Medium-sized companies want to increase staff in technology, followed by analytics;
Small companies have the greatest need for technology talent, followed by claims;
Technology and product management are the top two areas in which companies are looking to add experienced staff;
Technology, analytics, and actuarial positions are the most difficult to fill; and
Operations and actuarial roles were identified as areas most likely to add entry-level positions.
Not all insurers are looking to hire more workers; 13 percent report that reorganization and automation will be the primary reasons for staff reductions during the next 12 months.
What companies can do to retain talent
Leaders are advised to become more methodical in how they keep valuable human capital from walking out the door. According to Anthony Klotz – the professor of management at the Mays Business School at Texas A&M University credited with coining the term “Great Resignation” – employers often don’t give enough thought to the off-boarding process and employees often don’t give the real reasons that they are quitting. Instead of just having an exit interview in which employees are asked why they’re leaving, he suggests talking to their coworkers and friends at the company who will be aware of their actual reasons.
Once the main causes of turnover are identified, a company can create customized programs to correct these issues. According to Ian Cook, an HR strategist, “adopting a truly data-driven retention strategy isn’t easy, but it’s worth the effort to do it right, especially in the current market…. With greater visibility into both how serious your turnover problem really is and the root causes that drive it, you’ll be empowered to attract top talent, reduce turnover costs, and ultimately build a more engaged and effective workforce.”
Of course, salary and benefits are still important in retaining and recruiting. Sixty percent of American employees say the COVID-19 crisis has caused them to think more carefully about the benefits their employer provides and about 68 percent anticipate their workplace benefits to play a more critical role in their future job selection, according to research from Voya Financial, Inc.
Many workers report feeling overwhelmed and depleted, a condition the pandemic has exacerbated. Employers can use the pandemic as an opportunity to offer an outstanding employee experience by listening and engaging with their workforce. After surveying hundreds of workers, McKinsey has identified several factors that go into the creating the right environment. They include: a sense of social cohesion, and purpose; collaborative teams; clear responsibilities and opportunities to learn and grow; an organizational sense of purpose that aligns with workers’ personal values; and a suitable physical and digital environment that gives them the flexibility to achieve a work–life balance.
People who report having a positive employee experience have 16 times the engagement level of employees with a negative experience, and they are eight times more likely to want to stay at a company, McKinsey research found.
Layoffs, loss of income, and living in isolation with abusers due to working remotely have increased the incidence of domestic violence. Associated Press photo.
By Loretta Worters, Vice President – Media Relations, Triple-I
When you think about domestic violence, insurance typically isn’t top of mind. But financial security and access to resources can make all the difference to victims when deciding to leave an abusive relationship. And insurance is an important component of financial planning that can help survivors move forward.
Financial abuse is a common tactic used by abusers to gain power and control in a relationship. The forms of financial abuse may be subtle or explicit but, in general, include tactics to conceal information, limit the victim’s access to assets, or reduce accessibility to the family finances.
Growing evidence shows the pandemic has made intimate partner violence more common—and often more severe. Layoffs, loss of income, and living in isolation with abusers due to working remotely have dramatically increased the incidence of domestic violence, further hampering a victim from leaving an abusive situation.
Survivors struggling to get back on their feet may also be forced to return to their abuser. That’s why it’s so important that survivors understand how insurance works and what a critical role it can play in gaining financial freedom and economic self-sufficiency.
In support of Domestic Violence Awareness Month, Triple-I offers financial strategies to protect victims before and after leaving an abusive relationship. They include securing financial records, knowing where the victim stands financially, building a financial safety net, making necessary changes to their insurance policies and maintaining good credit.
The National Coalition Against Domestic Violence (NCADV) reports that 10 million people are physically abused by an intimate partner each year, and 20,000 calls are placed to domestic violence hotlines each day. In addition, 85 percent of women who leave an abusive relationship return because of their economic dependence on their abusers.
“Home is often times a dangerous place for survivors of domestic violence, and COVID-19 exacerbates the circumstances, due to the abusers’ ability to further control,” said Ruth Glenn, president and CEO of the NCADV. “Tactics abusers use include ruining the credit of their victim as well as financial and digital abuse, such as stimulus funds being co-opted by abusers to an increase in domestic online harassment,” she said.
Experts agree that domestic online harassment can come in many forms, from impersonating a victim by email to sabotage her work to controlling information about the pandemic to make her more fearful and dependent.
Since 2005, The Allstate Foundation has been committed to ending domestic violence through financial empowerment by helping to provide survivors with the education and resources needed to achieve their potential and equip young people with the information and confidence they need to help prevent unhealthy relationships before they start. The Allstate Foundation offers a Moving Ahead Curriculum, a five-module program that helps prepare survivors as they move from short-term safety to long-term security. Modules of the curriculum include: Understanding Financial Abuse; Learning Financial Fundamentals; Mastering Credit Basics; Building Financial Foundations and Long-Term Planning.
“One of the most powerful methods of keeping a survivor trapped in an abusive relationship is not being able to support themselves financially,” Glenn explained. “That’s why insurance and financial education are so important,” she said. “Education can save a life.”
As cyberattacks have increased in recent years, one area of particular concern has been those that target hospitals and health systems. These attacks have affected not only private information but also threatened the lives and well-being of patients.
A major shift
Hospitals rely more than ever on computerized systems to manage their information and systems. With the added complications related to the COVID-19 pandemic, the dangers associated with cyberattacks have only worsened.
“It’s part of a trend we’ve seen building over the last couple years, even before the pandemic,” said Scott Shackelford, chairman of the IU Cybersecurity Risk Management Program. Unfortunately, health-care providers are very much in the crosshairs. Not only do they often have insurance and deep pockets, but doctors need access to patient information to perform procedures and provide required services.
Because of this vulnerability and urgency, Shackelford said, “They are more likely to pay up.”
“If you look at the surveys that have been done, about one-in-three health providers have been hit by ransomware attacks just since 2020, and there’s been a 45 percent uptick in that rate since last December,” Shackelford added.
One recent attack, on Johnson Memorial Health in Franklin, Indiana, disabled its computer system. Although the hospital said it could still manage its patient intake, the loss of computer capabilities slowed operations down dramatically.
“We’re used to sending lab orders via computer, sending prescriptions to pharmacies via computer, so we’re going back to a real reliance on paper again,” Johnson Memorial President and CEO David Dunkle said. “We’re using more human runners, people taking lab recs between the ER and the lab.”
Hospitals have been slow to respond
Although there have been major technological advancements in the medical field, not all health systems have provided robust IT teams or thorough safety protocols. One area of note is with new medical devices, which take years to earn FDA approval and can come with outmoded software and operating systems without the latest security mechanisms.
This has given hackers the ability to disable medical imaging devices like MRIs. They can then shut down or interfere with machines. A recent study by McAfeeEnterprise’s Advanced Threat Research Team uncovered that an IV pump created by German medical manufacturer B. Braun possessed a susceptibility that would allow hackers to change medicine doses remotely.
And while traditional phishing attacks require a user to open a corrupted file — a trend that is now on the decline — new attacks can use so-called Zero Click malware, which can infect a system merely through receiving a text or email.
Additionally, sensitive data that health systems possess gives hackers the opportunity to sell this information online — or threaten to — with demands rising into the millions of dollars. After a 2009 U.S. law was passed that required Medicare and Medicaid providers to implement electronic health records, these risks have only accelerated.
Life and death circumstances
Hospitals are now not only seeing the financial risks with cyberattacks, but the threat to their patients’ lives.
In July 2019, Springhill Medical Center faced a massive ransomware attack that disabled its electronic devices. This failure created dire circumstances for one infant, causing doctors to be unable to monitor the child’s condition during delivery. The infant died, and the hospital is being sued by the mother for malpractice—a charge Springhill denies.
Another attack in Düsseldorf, Germany in 2020 saw the death of a 78-year-old woman from an aortic aneurysm. What was supposed to be a routine pick-up turned into a nightmare, when the local hospital’s system was disabled by a ransomware attack, forcing the emergency department to turn away the woman and causing the ambulance to travel much farther. During this time, the patient’s condition worsened, and she eventually died.
How much worse can it get?
By the middle of August of 2021, 38 attacks on health-care providers or systems had interrupted care at approximately 963 U.S. locations. For all of 2020, only 560 sites were affected in 80 separate incidents, according to Brett Callow, a threat analyst at security firm Emsisoft.
With the vast amount of data and equipment at each of these health facilities—as well as the linked networks of many systems—the threat of cyberattacks in health care will only continue to grow unless more action is taken.
Sean Kevelighan leads Climate Risk and Resilience panel. (Photo/videos by Scott Holeman, Media Relations Director, Triple-I)
By Loretta Worters, Vice President, Media Relations, Triple-I
Insuretech Connect – the world’s largest gathering of insurance leaders and innovators – last week brought together insurance technology stakeholders to network, share insights, and learn about leading-edge technology across all insurance lines.
Conference participants included Pete Miller, president and CEO of The Institutes, who discussed risk mitigation through new technology.
“Capturing data about the things we do and then allowing us to mitigate risk before we even get to the insurance function, that’s really where I think this industry is going,” he said.
One panel, Climate Risk and Resilience, focused on the importance of Insurtech and innovation to the success and sustainability of the industry. Moderated by Triple-I CEO Sean Kevelighan, the panel included Sean Ringsted, chief digital officer at Chubb; Christie McNeill, associate partner with McKinsey & Company and leader of ESG and Climate Change for the Insurance Practice in North America; Alisa Valderrama, CEO and co-founder of FutureProof Technologies, a venture-backed financial analytics software company specializing in climate risk; and Susan Holliday, Triple-I nonresident scholar and senior advisor to the International Finance Corporation (IFC) and the World Bank, where she focuses on insurance and Insuretech.
“Insurers are no stranger to climate and extreme weather,” Kevelighan said. “They have had a financial stake in it for decades.”
He noted that insured losses caused by natural disasters have grown by nearly 700 percent since the 1980s and four of the five costliest natural disasters in U.S. history have occurred over the past decade.
U.S. insurers paid out $67 billion in 2020 due to natural disasters. The insured losses emerged in part as the result of 13 hurricanes, five of the six largest wildfires in California’s history, and a derecho that caused significant damage in Iowa.
This year’s Hurricane Ida is expected to cost insurers at least $31 billion and to push Hurricane Andrew out of the top five damaging storms. 2021 has been another record year for wildfires. January 1 to September 19, 2021 there were 45,118 wildfires, compared with 43,556 in the same period in 2020.
The panelists talked about how insurers have long been aware of climate risk and – to the extent that existing data-gathering and modeling technologies allowed – considered it in risk pricing and reserving. As information storage and processing have vastly improved, the industry has not only gotten better at underwriting and reserving for these risks – it has identified opportunities in areas it once could only view as problems.
Improved modeling, for example, has increased insurers’ comfort with and appetite for writing flood coverage and spurred the development of new products.
“Insurers are and always will be financial first responders, but there’s a growing realization that risk transfer alone isn’t enough,” Kevelighan said. “Insurance is one important step toward resilience. It’s well documented that better-insured communities recover faster from disasters. But more is required to address increasingly complex global risks.”
Triple-I CEO Sean Kevelighan will join a virtual panel on Wednesday, Oct. 13, at 11 a.m., ET, to brief public policymakers on ways to build a robust cyber risk insurance market.
“To allow businesses to operate safely in an increasingly interconnected world, insurers are working closely with their commercial customers to mitigate cyber risks and to make sure businesses have the right types, and amounts, of cyber insurance,” Kevelighan said. “However, as we are seeing increasing uncertainty in the extensiveness of cyber risk, it is also essential that we better understand the role government needs to play in particular around law enforcement and international diplomacy.”
As previously noted in The Triple-I Blog, some in the national security world have compared U.S. cybersecurity preparedness today to its readiness for large terrorist acts prior to 9/11. Before those attacks, terrorism coverage was included in most commercial property policies as a “silent” peril – not specifically excluded, therefore covered. Afterward, insurers began excluding terrorist acts from policies, and the U.S. government established the Terrorism Risk Insurance Act to stabilize the market.
“A balanced public-private partnership that recognizes where insurance can be a helpful financial responder, and how government is an essential preventative tool, will be critical to helping mitigate the ever-increasing cyber risks we are facing in the world,” Kevelighan said.
Presented by Indiana University’s Ostrom Workshop and Cybersecurity Risk Management Program in collaboration with The Institutes Griffith Insurance Education Foundation, the discussion can be viewed free of charge by public policymakers who register online in advance. It is one of three Cybersecurity Policy Bootcamp sessions the two organizations are co-hosting in October as part of Cyber Security Awareness Month.
The one-hour session will focus on Deepening Partnerships Between States, the Federal Government, the Private Sector, and Academia to Build a Robust Cyber Risk Insurance Market.
Along with Kevelighan on the panel will be three other subject matter experts:
Elizabeth Kelleher Dwyer, Esq., superintendent of Financial Services for Rhode Island Department of Business Regulation;
Scott J. Shackelford, JD, PhD, chair of the Cybersecurity Program at Indiana University, Bloomington; and
Douglas Swetnam, section chief for Data Privacy & Identity Theft in the Indiana Attorney General’s Office
Frank Tomasello, executive director for the Institutes Griffith Insurance Education Foundation, will be the panel’s moderator.
