One of my big complaints about property-casualty insurers is that with the industry split on several critical issues, it's difficult to get some badly needed reforms passed in Washington or the individual states. However, PCI President and CEO David Sampson says the industry is united on far more issues than the few dividing the various segments and associations, while predicting an even closer working relationship among the key players in the face of the “real existential threats” ahead.

Mr. Sampson knows the ways of Washington well, having served as deputy secretary in the U.S. Commerce Department before joining the Property Casualty Insurers Association of America last summer. But he believes he has a pretty good idea after nine months in his new job how the industry can work together even though individual players don't always see eye-to-eye.

Indeed, in a visit to NU's Hoboken headquarters office today, Mr. Sampson pretty much dismissed my suggestion that intra-industry disputes over hot-button issues such as federal regulation and catastrophe coverage undermine efforts to push through regulatory and market reforms–particularly in Congress.

“There's already a strong collegiality” among the p-c trade groups, he said, pointing to how the industry united to support extension of the Terrorism Risk Insurance Act last year, and more recently to head off the addition of wind exposures to the National Flood Insurance Program.

Going forward, he predicted similar harmony in opposing any attempt–on the state or federal levels–to restrict or even ban the use of credit scores in underwriting, as well as to lobby for passage of bills in Congress to mitigate the damage caused by natural disasters.

He noted that the insurance industry led the way in the past in improving workplace safety through the efforts of workers' compensation carriers, as well as making driving less risky by establishing the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety.

While the industry has initiated a similar effort in the property market through the work of the Institute for Business and Home Safety, Mr. Sampson said insurers can do more to focus attention on loss control options.

He cited industry lobbying in support of bills–both federal and local–to bolster building codes, sharpen zoning laws and provide tax incentives to convince policyholders to retrofit their properties to better withstand the elements.

However, he said the biggest impact the industry can have is in convincing the public to take the threat seriously in the first place. “It's a human tendency to think it won't happen to me, or if it already did, that it won't happen to me again,” he said. 'It's amazing how people tend to think of catastrophes as flukes or one-off events.”

The industry is united, he said, in convincing the public that's not the case. “There is a tremendous opportunity here,” he added, for insurers to make sure construction and development are sensibly handled, so that structures can take a bigger hit.

When I cited the gulf within the business over federal regulation, Mr. Sampson insisted there is common ground among insurers and producers even on this battlefield.

For one, he noted, the industry remains united on the need for state regulatory reform. With federal oversight not exactly around the corner, he expects all insurer and producer associations to work together to keep the heat on the National Association of Insurance Commissioners and individual state insurance departments to forge a less-costly, more standardized regulatory structure. A bill in Congress to set federal benchmarks for states to implement in surplus lines and reinsurance regulation also has strong industry support, he noted.

As the debate over an OFC continues, he cited agreement within the business to battle against ending up with the worst of both worlds–a dual regulatory system, in which Uncle Sam reserves the right to interfere in the business of state-chartered carriers, and vice versa.

However, he conceded there are times when segments of the industry will have to agree to disagree. For example, one big PCI member, Allstate, strongly backs a national catastrophe fund, and pretty much created ProtectingAmerica.org to make that happen.

PCI, while backing a “federal liquidity facility for well-run state cat funds,” according to Mr. Sampson, “does not think it is wise for the federal government to get into the business of reinsurance.” Thus, Allstate is going its own way, leaving PCI at year's end.

But when the chips are down, if Congress sees a more substantial Democratic majority elected in November, and especially if the White House changes parties, Mr. Sampson believes insurers will work closely together to oppose any attempt by Washington to micromanage the industry's operations, or impose unreasonable demands and restrictions on the business.

Perhaps a cataclysmic event like a Democrat taking the White House will bring the industry together once and for all, but I'll believe it when I see it–both a Democrat taking the White House and a united p-c industry!

What do you folks think?

(For more coverage of Mr. Sampson's visit with NU, see Dan Hays' news story by clicking here.)

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