“The life insurance industry is filled with good people who believe in their work and their companies, but who may never have challenged the assumptions underlying their efforts.”

— Andrew Tobias

Source: The Invisible Bankers, Everything The Insurance Industry Never Wanted You To Know (1982), Chapter 4, Tell Us The Odds, p. 65.

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Andrew Tobias 19

American journalist 1947

Gerry Spence (1929) American lawyer

As quoted in Humanscape : Environments for People (1987), by Rachel Kaplan and Stephen Kaplan, p. 97

“My idea of good company, Mr. Eliot, is the company of clever, well-informed people who have a great deal of conversation; that is what I call good company.”

Jane Austen book Persuasion

Source: Persuasion

“In short: Readily available low-cost life insurance would be a threat to the industry, and whatever threatens the life insurance industry threatens America.”

Andrew Tobias (1947) American journalist

Source: The Invisible Bankers, Everything The Insurance Industry Never Wanted You To Know (1982), Chapter 13, Gerber Life: Like Taking Candy From A Baby, p. 239.

“My idea of good company… is the company of clever, well-informed people, who have a great deal of conversation; that is what I call good company.'
'You are mistaken,' said he gently, 'that is not good company, that is the best.”

Jane Austen book Persuasion

Source: Persuasion

“Insurance companies nowadays apply the principle of so-called 'selection by insurance'; this means that they take into consideration the fact that persons who enter early into insurance contracts are on the average of a different type and have a different distribution of death ages from persons from persons admitted to the insurance at a more advanced age.”

Richard von Mises (1883–1953) Austrian physicist and mathematician

First Lecture, The Definition of Probability, p. 18
Probability, Statistics And Truth - Second Revised English Edition - (1957)

“The graveyard of any industry is filled with the headstones of companies who decided to keep doing things the same old way. Playing only on the margin, making things just a little bit better. That strategy works…. for a while, but ultimately it's fatal. Over the years our industry has come to accept progress simply by what’s on the screen.”

Reggie Fils-Aimé (1961) American businessman

Source: E3 2006 Press Conference

“Washington, D. C. is a city filled with people who believe they are important.”

David Brinkley (1920–2003) American journalist

as cited in Great Political Wit: laughing (almost) all the way to the White House (2000), Bob Dole, Random House, p. 89 : ISBN 0767906675, 9780767906678

“There are information asymmetries in this story. Health insurance is limping along. It's limited in scope, and then you other consequences. Insurance companies have high premiums to protect themselves. The ones who come to the insurance company are sicker and the people have to pay more. You have adverse selection. You have moral hazard. And the doctor does what's on the safe side -- defensive medicine -- without regard to cost. These are fundamental conditions that make health insurance difficult. You have some things that help. Some doctors understand that they shouldn't abuse the system. But you still see problems in the way doctors behave towards patients. They goof off. Sometimes it's too much work. Some things are difficult and risky to diagnose.”

Kenneth Arrow (1921–2017) American economist

quoted in Conor Clarke, An Interview with Kenneth Arrow, Part Two https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2009/07/an-interview-with-kenneth-arrow-part-two/22279/ (2009)
New millennium

“What may be very entertaining in company with ignorant people may be tiresome to those who know more of the matter.”

James Burgh (1714–1775) British politician

The Dignity of Human Nature (1754)

“Prior to the Industrial Revolution, the daily life of most humans ran its course within three ancient frames: the nuclear family, the extended family and the local intimate community.* Most people worked in the family business – the family farm or the family workshop, for example – or they worked in their neighbours’ family businesses. The family was also the welfare system, the health system, the education system, the construction industry, the trade union, the pension fund, the insurance company, the radio, the television, the newspapers, the bank and even the police.”

Yuval Noah Harari book Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind

Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind

“The life insurance industry is filled with good people who believe in their work and their companies, but who may never have challenged the assumptions underlying their efforts.”

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Andrew Tobias 19

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