?The current premium growth pattern is eerily reminiscent of the soft market of the late 1990s,? Bob Hartwig, chief economist for the Insurance Information Institute, wrote in a report released yesterday. ?Those years presaged some of the worst years in insurance industry history.?

Competition in 1997 and 1998 led to industry-wide annual underwriting losses through 2001 because rates on property and casualty coverage proved to be too low to profitably cover claims. Annual sales growth that was as high as 14.6 percent in 2002 is forecast to slow to 2.8 percent this year before decelerating to the 1.5 percent in 2007, according to the institute?s yearly survey of analysts and consultants.

Even as prices on most types of coverage fall, insurers next year are expected to earn an underwriting profit for only the third time since 1978. Claims and expenses are forecast to use up 97.6 cents of every $1 in premiums, making the comparison with the cycle of the 1990s ?premature,? Hartwig said. This year the ratio is expected to be 94.3 cents, the best since at least 1955, he said.