EVOLUTION OF ECONOMY AND ITS IMPACT ON INSURANCE MARKET – A STATISTICAL ANALYSIS

The economic context has a strong impact on the insurance sector. On the one hand, the decisions related to sector regulation could influence the life of the insurance companies. On the other hand, taxes and other measures that may affect purchasing power, economic instability represent a threat. It is a fact that insurances are products that customers and companies access them when economic conditions are predictable and budgets could be accurately predicted. The paper mainly analyzes in terms of indicators, the impact of the economy on the insurance sector. We are talking about the interrelationships between Gross Written Premiums (the insurance "Budget") and some macroeconomic indicators characterizing the Romanian economy, such as Gross Domestic Product, net average earnings, the average number of employees etc. Statistical analysis is performed for a 12-year period during 2002-2013. This analysis is based on official statistics published by the National Institute of Statistics, the National Forecasting Commission and the National Bank of Romania. The methodology consists of correlation and regression analysis. Of the variables used in the study we mention: Gross Domestic Product, the number of employees, employment, net average earnings, the activity rate of the working age population (15-64 years), non-governmental domestic credit. The analysis of correlation between the studied variables reveals that is a strong correlation between Gross Written Premiums and GDP, the number of employees, average earnings and non-government domestic credit.. Thus, economic growth, rising incomes, the increasing number of employees and facilitating credit conditions could be some elements that would lead to sustainable growth of the insurance market