Louis Goggans reports on a new survey that says Memphis and other Shelby County cities have the highest car insurance rates in Tennessee.
Categories
Month: July 2014
A new study reveals that Memphis isn’t the best place to get car insurance if you’re trying to save a few dollars.
Consumer finance company ValuePenguin analyzed car insurance rates in 44 cities across Tennessee. Results of the study revealed that Memphis has the highest rates. In Memphis, a person spends $1,212 a year on average for car insurance.
The ValuePenguin study discovered that the top five cities with the highest insurance rates in Tennessee were all in the Memphis metro area. Aside from Memphis, these areas are Bartlett ($1,049), Germantown ($1,038), Collierville ($1,032), and Dyersburg ($979).
To get quotes from car insurance companies for the study, the company assumed the identity of a 30-year-old male driver who is single. He imaginatively drove a 2010 Toyota Camry that he bought and used to commute to and from his place of employment, according to the study. The driver had no at-fault accidents or violations in the last five years.
ValuePenguin looked at insurance quotes from the 10 top auto insurers that operate throughout Tennessee, averaging rates across the companies to come up with a final number for each city. Those companies included GEICO, State Farm, Nationwide, Allstate, Liberty Mutual, and several others.
The top five cities with the cheapest insurance rates are Bristol ($810), Kingsport ($813), Johnson City ($830), Brentwood ($857), and Gallatin ($871), according to the study.
Brian Quinn, co-founder of ValuePenguin, said the company publishes unique analysis and creates user-friendly tools that help individuals make more informed financial decisions. The company is currently in the process of conducting auto insurance studies for every state in the country.
“We hope that Tennesseeans understand how much average auto insurances prices can vary depending on where they live within the state,” Quinn said. “The majority of the work we do at ValuePenguin is digging into big data related to consumer finance issues. Once we did a handful of the state breakdowns and got great feedback, we realized we needed to do the analysis nationwide.”
According to ValuePenguin’s Tennessee study, cities with expensive auto insurance rates were typically close to high crime areas and/or high population density areas. Cities with cheaper with auto insurance rates normally had a lower population density and lower crime rates.
The five most expensive cities had an average annual rate of $1,062 while the five cheapest areas had yearly annual premiums around $836. The average cost of car insurance in Tennessee was $916 per year, according to the study.
Other cities analyzed in the study include Smyrna, Murfreesboro, Chattanooga, Cleveland, Athens, Knoxville, Columbia, Nashville, Jackson, Union City, and various others.
Categories
Eggs With Potato Chips?
Scrambled eggs with potato chips? Ari LaVaux says, why not? It’s all about the migas, and almost anything goes.
Categories
City Council Ponders Retiree “Safety Net”
Toby Sells reports on the city council discussions about a “safety net” for retired former employees.
A $2 million safety net could be on the way for retired Memphis city employees affected by the recent cuts to their health care benefits by the Memphis City Council two weeks ago.
A council committee approved the money for the safety net Tuesday. The committee will discuss the funds again in two weeks before it goes for a final vote by the full council.
The funds would not come from the city’s regular budget, said George Little, the city’s chief administrative officer. The funds for the safety net would come from savings found from Cigna, the city’s healthcare provider, through administration fees and some other programs.
The safety net was proposed by council member Edmund Ford Jr. The fund would help some retirees that could have “extreme” financial hardships when the changes to the benefits take effect in October. The safety net would help them pay co-pays, deductibles, and more.
The health care changes came as council members passed the city’s budget two weeks ago. The changes will take away some major health care subsidies from retirees over age 65 and will replace them with Medigap coverage or another plan. The changes will also cut the spouses of city employees from the city’s health insurance plan if they are eligible to get insurance rom their employer. The changes will also levy a higher monthly charge of $120 for smokers on the city insurance plan.
“I applaud (council member Edmund) Ford for digging into this and finding out there are cracks in the system,” said council member Harold Collins, “but when we made this vote, we were assured by (human resources director Quintin Robinson) that y’all did everything to do to assure we not have these kinds of cracks.”
Collins and other council members worried that $2 million might not be enough money to cover all the hardships out there. They also wondered what defined a “hardship” because all financial situations are different.
But council member Joe Brown said making a safety net at all was “hypocrisy” because the council and administration had taken away “something that retirees had rights to.”
“We committed a crime against retirees and now we’re coming back and saying we’ll give you a little leniency,” Brown said. “Making (the healthcare benefit) whole is the only way to make it right.”
Ford also expressed concerned that many (if not most) of the retirees for which the city is paying the healthcare subsidy don’t live in Memphis. The idea of residency requirements for employees was raised and quickly fell but was left on the table for discussion and called a “problem” by council member Bill Boyd.
Council members worried that the safety net program could grow too large or might not be able to take care of all with financial hardships in the wake of the group’s budget vote.
“We’re not going to leave anyone behind,” Little said.
Categories
Tiger Trivia Tuesday
For the first time since 2000 and 2001, the NBA has conducted consecutive drafts without a Memphis Tiger being chosen. (Will Barton was the last Tiger taken, in the second round of the 2012 draft.)
What is the longest consecutive-year streak for Tigers drafted into the NBA?
