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The Eaton and Palisades fires are now the most expensive wildfire disaster in U.S. history — and what's happening in Los Angeles right now is a real-time stress test of the entire insurance value chain. From how models priced the risk, to how policies were written and sold, to how claims are being managed on the ground.
Joy Chen is a former deputy mayor of Los Angeles with a finance background, and she runs the Every Fire Survivors Network — 10,000-plus Eaton and Palisades survivors. Her group has spent the last year and a half documenting delays, denials, and underpayments among insured survivors. Among the statistics they point to: a $300,000 median gap between expected insurance payouts and actual rebuilding costs, and a recovery pace slower than any previous California wildfire on record — including the Camp Fire.
The question is whether these are simply the normal costs and challenges of a large catastrophe, or market signals about model adequacy — and what happens to market confidence, and ultimately to capacity, when the system fails at scale.
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Joy Chen is a former deputy mayor of Los Angeles with a finance background, and she runs the Every Fire Survivors Network — 10,000-plus Eaton and Palisades survivors. Her group has spent the last year and a half documenting delays, denials, and underpayments among insured survivors. Among the statistics they point to: a $300,000 median gap between expected insurance payouts and actual rebuilding costs, and a recovery pace slower than any previous California wildfire on record — including the Camp Fire.
The question is whether these are simply the normal costs and challenges of a large catastrophe, or market signals about model adequacy — and what happens to market confidence, and ultimately to capacity, when the system fails at scale.
Subscribe to Risk Market News
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What is Risky Science Podcast?
The Risky Science Podcast features conversations with scientists, insurers, investors, portfolio managers, and others about the evolving science of predicting and modeling risk across both natural and man-made perils.