Actuarial Notes

Discrimination and Insurance

By Ronen Avraham · University of Texas School of Law · 2017 · Law and Economic Research Paper No. E574

Study guide: Exam 6I

A chapter by Ronen Avraham asking when it is fair and just for insurers to discriminate between groups on the basis of their actuarial risk. It sets out the confusion in the legal treatment of anti-discrimination norms in insurance, argues that the philosophical literature on discrimination is written at too high a level of abstraction to guide insurance policy, and proposes a theoretical framework to help policy makers apply a fair and just anti-discrimination policy. Written for The Routledge Handbook to Discrimination (ed. Lippert-Rasmussen) and issued as a University of Texas School of Law research paper.

On the syllabus

  • Exam 6I — objectives A3, A5; the whole paper.

Introduction

  • Example 1: in 2011 the European Court of Justice forbade charging women less than men for life insurance (Test-Achats), a practice not entirely forbidden in many US states.
  • Example 2: in the late 1970s and early 1980s the US Supreme Court forbade charging women more than men for employer-provided pension insurance, or paying them smaller monthly benefits (Manhart, Norris), a practice not entirely forbidden in the EU.

The Existing Approach for Statistical Discrimination by Insurers

  • The EU Legal Landscape
  • The US Legal Landscape
    • Inconsistent Treatment of Discrimination across States' Statutes
    • Inconsistent Treatment of Discrimination by Courts
    • Inconsistent Treatment of Discrimination by Legal Commentators

Unique Features of a Theoretical Framework

The Moral Requirements From a Theoretical Framework

  • Stage One: The Relevant Factors for Fair Discrimination
    • A. The First Factor: The Characteristics
    • B. The Second Factor: The Line of Insurance
    • C. The Third Factor: The Nature of the Discriminatory Treatment
  • Stage Two: The Tradeoff between Equality and its Consequences

Conclusion

Sources

  • Discrimination and Insurance (Ronen Avraham, CAS copy) — the document: the University of Texas School of Law cover page (Law and Economic Research Paper No. E574), the title, author, abstract, the note that it is forthcoming in The Routledge Handbook to Discrimination (Lippert-Rasmussen ed.), the headings (unnumbered in the original; their nesting read from the type styles) and the two examples in the introduction (sha256 863a8c033f2b90ce…); the paper prints no date, so the year (2017) is taken from the content outline
  • CAS Exam 6I Content Outline, Fall 2026 — the citation (The Routledge Handbook to Discrimination, Lippert-Rasmussen ed., University of Texas Law, Law and Econ Research Paper No. E574, 2017) and the assignment (objectives A3, A5)