TRENTON – Lawmakers this week could vote to increase the minimum amount of auto insurance coverage that drivers must have, probably adding $120 or more to the yearly premiums of 1.1 million drivers.
The required minimum for liability coverage – $15,000 for a crash in which one person is injured and $30,000 for injuries of two or more people – hasn’t been raised since 1972 and doesn’t cover the costs resulting from the average accident in which an insurance claim is filed.
But the 21% of drivers with that minimum insurance generally carry it only because it’s required and cannot afford more. And so even though the bill moving the Legislature was amended to remove some provisions that could have pushed up the average bill more than $300, the idea still has many critics.
James Lynch, president of the New Jersey Association for Justice, a group of personal injury and civil law attorneys, said he knows no one likes paying for insurance but says after people are involved in a crash, they wish they’d paid for extra coverage .
“Someone that doesn’t have a lot of money, maybe that extra $10,000 in recovery would be extraordinarily meaningful to them – extraordinarily,” Lynch said.
The bill requires the current $15,000/$30,000 worth of liability coverage to increase to $25,000/$50,000 starting in January 2023. A second step to a $35,000/$70,000 minimum would take effect in 2026. Also, the coverage for property damage would increase to a minimum of $25,000.
More uninsured drivers?
Gary LaSpisa, vice president of the Insurance Council of New Jersey, said the second increase in 2026 should be removed from the bill and revisited later, though he was glad other provisions of the plan got removed – going to $50,000/$100,000 as a minimum and raising the minimum personal injury protection,