The news: The insurance industry is fact-checking former President Donald Trump for a post on the social media platform X (formerly known as Twitter), in which he wrote: “Your Automobile insurance is up 73%—VOTE FOR TRUMP, I’LL CUT THAT NUMBER IN HALF!”
- The Insurance Journal looked into where Trump got that data point and whether a president can indeed reduce auto insurance premiums.
Where did he get that number? Robert Hartwig, an economics professor at the University of South Carolina and former president of the Insurance Information Institute, told the Insurance Journal that the 73% figure doesn’t coincide with any important political events, and its source is unclear. Hartwig also wondered how it was calculated and what period of time it covers.
- After working his way through the US Bureau of Labor Statistics data, Hartwig said that in September 2016, two months before Trump was elected and four months before he took office, auto insurance was 73.6% lower.