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Congress extends Terrorism Risk Insurance Program through 2034
The House approved the measure June 29 by a 373-15 vote, renewing a framework lawmakers built after Sept. 11 to address modelable, industry-wide terrorism losses.
The US House of Representatives voted 373-15 on June 29 to extend the Terrorism Risk Insurance Program through 2034, a renewal of the policy framework that Congress created in direct response to the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, according to Insurance Business. Insurance Business notes that the attacks killed nearly 3,000 people and, using Congressional Research Service figures, produced about $60 billion in insured losses in current dollars across multiple lines, including property, aviation, life, workers' compensation, and liability. The outlet also describes how insurers and reinsurers reevaluated what makes a risk insurable after Sept. 11. Terrorism failed tests around whether losses can be modeled with reasonable confidence, whether they occur close to randomly, and whether they remain independent rather than clustering into one another, with reinsurers pulling coverage from commercial policies almost overnight. Insurance Business says Congress acted quickly on two fronts. Eleven days after the attacks, it passed the Air Transportation Safety and System Stabilization Act, capping each airline's liability for the Sept. 11 crashes at the coverage the carrier already held, which commentators at the time valued at roughly $6 billion across the four aircraft, and it also created the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund as a no-fault alternative to litigation.