This is the last in a three-part series on insurance in China. The first introduced the arrival of insurance in Hong Kong and the second the adoption of insurance in mainland China. While the industry was more well-developed in terms of the number of firms and customer adoption by the 1930s than many might…
This is the second in a three-part series on the history of insurance in China. The first introduced the arrival of insurance in Hong Kong and the 19th century development of the insurance industry there. While the city’s mimicking of British company law and the growing volume of trade transiting through it stimulated insurance in…
Insuring property predates insurance on lives and within property insurance, ships were among the earliest things to be insured. They are large valuable assets subject to many risks and, when damaged at sea, are often lost in their entirety. The incentive to insure ships, and their cargoes, is very high. In Europe and in Asia,…
This is the second in a two-part post. In the first, Berkshire Hathaway discovered the compatibility of insurance with an investment firm in 1967, when it acquired the insurance company National Indemnity. However, there was one particular type of insurance that offered an even better synergy, reinsurance. Reinsurance could offer Berkshire a still more…
Berkshire Hathaway is a diversified conglomerate, a holding company for businesses spanning electrical utilities, railways, and insurance. But these parts are not quite equal. To say that Berkshire merely spans so broadly as to include some insurance businesses, but they are otherwise not particularly special, would understate the importance of these divisions of the…
While certain risks are easy to insure against in a cost-effective manner, others are more difficult. Some risks are nearly impossible to insure against because they are too costly or the risk is either very difficult to measure or very high. In these cases, insurance may become completely unavailable if not offered with some…
In the years before the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923, fire insurance was gaining more widespread adoption in Japan. For many insurance companies, it was becoming their largest line of business. Unfortunately, the earthquake and the fires that followed challenged this growth. Many looked to the insurance companies to pay claims after the disaster…
Governments tend to be very involved in supporting their country’s agriculture. In various countries, this intervention ranges from funding research programs and irrigation projects, setting stringent regulations and grading standards, managing supply, protecting use of certain names and geographic labelling, and even involvement in farm finance such as by providing credit to farmers. In…
Growing populations, urbanization, and industrialization led to surging insurance needs in Europe in the 19th century. To meet this need, hundreds of new insurance companies were formed across the continent. However, these same trends also made insurance a riskier business. The growth meant that a factory or town burning down in 1860 could be…
In the late 18th century, marine insurance in a nascent United States was put to a stressful test. During an undeclared naval war between America and France known as the Quasi-War, merchants were ruined and losses to insurance underwriters rose, as did the frequency of insurance disputes. In the end, insurance not only survived…
