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April 13, 2015 at 08:20 AM
Someday soon, Big Brother may be watching you. Only his name will be “John Hancock.”
The insurer is rolling out a program in the U.S. similar to ones already deployed in other parts of the world, where your life insurer tracks your fitness levels, then gives you rebates depending on how active you are. Folks who get up in the morning and jog five miles will get rebates; couch potatoes who can barely make it to the kitchen for another soda will be paying more.
I’m sure this makes sound business sense in an industry that isn’t exactly experiencing roaring demand growth. But if it becomes common, I’d expect some pushback. After all, this is exactly the sort of sound underwriting we just outlawed in the health insurance market.
When this shakes out, we’re likely to find that the biggest discounts are disproportionately going to folks with higher incomes, who are educated and healthier. On an actuarial basis, this makes total sense, because those people are the least likely to die in the near future and cost their insurer a bunch of money. But the necessary corollary is that people who are poorer, less educated and not as healthy are, on top of all their other worries, also paying more for their health insurance. So programs like John Hancock’s are likely to attract negative attention from the same people and groups who don’t like insurance companies using credit ratings to price insurance.
