From: ce293@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Gail E. Brookhart)
Newsgroups: rec.pets.dogs
Subject: Re: Adding to Pet Peeves
Date: 8 Jan 1993 13:00:35 GMT
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH (USA)
Reply-To: ce293@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Gail E. Brookhart)
NNTP-Posting-Host: hela.ins.cwru.edu


In a previous article, Terri_Watson@cs.cmu.edu (Elfling) says:

>OK, sorry it took so long to follow up on this but chasing these
>people down is time consuming.  I thought Mike's question was a good
>one so I called random insurance company X (which in this case is
>Allstate).  After getting re-routed up the chain of command & then to
>the underwriters, here's what I learned.

Yea!  Atta girl, Terri!  Thank you for looking into this for all of us!

>
>I talked with Andre Howell (sp?) who is a public relations kind of
>person.  He returned my call & what he knew w/o having a chance to
>research it was:
>   - stats are collected by some group (he doesn't know who yet) from
>police reports
>   - incidence of bites by breed types (yes, there is still a problem
>of identification -- we didn't discuss that)

Agreed!  Anyone remember hearing about the police in Arizona who shot a
boxer in its own yard for being an aggressive pit bull?


>   - they have analyzed the data for geographical trends, but to date
>there aren't any to be seen
>   - they also have "experts" that describe a breed's general
>temperment & this is factored in.
>
What certifies their expertise?  If I put expert on a business card, who is
going to question me?


>I asked if they "normalize" the number of bites for a particular breed
>in some fashion, so that they don't mis-represent a popular breed as
>viscous.  (We had a short discussion on statistics here & he agrees
>that it is a good idea, but he doesn't know if they do it.  He plans
>to ask when he gets more info.)
>
Great point!  And <GRINS!> a viscous dog is hard to pour because it is
sticky!  But I know that you meant vicious!  <grin>


>At this point, he is taking a couple of days to try to get more
>information (how the numbers are used, what the name of the org that
>they come from is, who the "experts" are, etc.) and then he'll call me
>again.
>
>I'll let you know what I find out.
>
>Remember, the insurance companies have to use statistics, even though
>an individual breed may not be at fault.  Take the case of a "fast"
>car.  While I could buy one & always drive it safely & at the posted
>speed limit, statistically, that's not what happens.  Thus higher
>rates.  While it may not be the case that a particular BREED is really
>a higher risk (just as it's not the car's fault), it may be that the
>kind of owner that BUYS a dog of a breed that has gotten an
>"agressive" labeling in the public eye, is.  Thus the statistics help
>the insurance company find the high risk OWNERS, by looking at the dog
>breed.  I'm certain that if we could find a better predictor than
>that, they would be ecstatic.
>
My problem with this is that the breeds in question are also among the most
intelligent and trainable for any behavior -- protective or otherwise. 
when I posted the original commentary on insurance and dogs I was as much
annoyed because they were ruling out dogs that are great dogs that do other
things than bite people.  GSD and Dobies are also used as guide dogs --
does that mean a blind person is going to face this problem with insurance?
 (Admittedly stretching a point here.)


>Until then let's only sell our puppies to responsible owners & try to
>educate the rest of the world about how to raise a well behaved dog.

And stamp out irresponsible breeders at the same time who only breed for a
buck and could care less about what they are doing to the breeds we love

>Maybe we can recommend that insurance companies give a break to owners
>whose dog(s) has (have) a CD -- kinda like giving a break to drivers
>that attended driving lessons.  That kind of promotion ahould probably
>be handled at the national level.

I wonder if the AKC is doing this?  They would seem to be the ones with the
money and the contacts to mount this type of campaign.  I would just
suggest that a discount be offered to anyone who has completed a training
course and not necessarily put a title on a dog.  It would be irresponsible
of me to take my Airedale off-lead for his CD as his past experiences make
him afraid of crowds and into a runner.  Just training with him was enough
to make me more responsible with him as the first dog in my life.
>
>Another interesting data point is to know if houses without dogs are
>more likely to be burgularized.  Unfortunately, to calculate this
>accurately you would need to know the percent of houses in an area
>that had dogs, as well as the percent that were bugerlarized that
>did/did not.  The first number would be difficult to get I imagine.
>
I talked to the police here in Cincinnati about this.  They say that they
think that smallish dogs are better as deterrents.  They claimed that the
bigger dogs are easier targets for bullets, clubs and hands while the
smaller dogs will dart back and forth too much to be caught while raising a
ruckus that will hopefully draw too much attention to a criminal and drive
him off.  I would still rather have a good Airedale or a Bouvier but this
is what the police think.

>Oh well, as always it seems like public education is the key.
>
>.Terri
>(companion to Amethyst Nausicaa O'Chancery <Tika> : Belgian Sheepdog)
>
A really great post Terri!  I appreciated all the research that you did!

Gail Brookhart 
ce293@cleveland.freenet.edu

Newsgroups: rec.pets.dogs