W. Robert Berkley
President and Chief Executive Officer at W. R. Berkley
Okay, great, Rich thanks very much. That was great as always. Okay. So a couple of quick soundbites from me and again, as promised, then we'll open it up for the Q&A.
The topline continues to be very healthy. I would tell you that in the specialty space in particular E&S but specialty in general, we are seeing continued strength in submissions and we're feeling particularly good about that. We're also seeing finally some resilience in the reinsurance market, consequently, as you saw the growth in that segment as well. On the insurance front is jumping around here. Other liability was particularly strong shorter tail was strong as well and commercial auto was reasonably robust.
As far as what the contribution to the disk drive 17 points of growth rate was a meaningful contributor ex comp. We were at 6.8% or so. I think it's important that people keep in mind and not confuse or decouple rate versus exposure growth. And one of the things that we've been very focused on and I worry that some industry participants may not be as focused on is a change and exposure, particularly in an inflationary environment. It's something that we pay a lot of attention to, obviously, there is an opportunity to keep up with it through payrolls on comp, GL as far as revenue, on the property front, the appraised values that you get at the time of the underwriting and inception, but making sure that one does not fall behind is an important thing and approximately two-thirds of our policies are adjustable based on exposure. So that's a really important piece to make sure that we can keep up with inflation.
As far as the strength of economy, certainly there is a lot of sensitivity and concern, but I would tell you as far as audit premiums at this stage, we are seeing considerable momentum on that front. Our audit premiums during the quarter were up 45% relative to the same period last year. And just on the retention front, something that I know we've discussed in the past and we're very sensitive to not churning the book and making sure that the quality and the integrity of the bucket intact [Phonetic] as we continue to push for rate and make sure that we're getting the appropriate exposure. Long story short, renewal retention remained just north of 80%. Loss ratio, obviously, Rich covered, bit of noise coming out of the CATs. I would characterize it as frequency of modest severity and that was probably the big story behind the 2.5 points.
From my perspective and we've heard this and we think we've talked about in past calls, we've heard from some people when they look at all the rate that we've gotten, why is it that we're not seeing the loss ratio drop even more on the current accident year. And the simple answer is, there is a lot of unknown, and there is a lot of volatility, and there are a lot of various leverage assumptions that we want to make sure we are appropriately thoughtful and measured and we don't respond too quickly. Some people would say cautious. We would say that we're just being thoughtful and measured given the inflationary environment both social as well as economic.
In addition to that, and we may have touched on this last quarter, we are sensitive to the backlog in the legal system. And our best estimate, which is nothing more than an estimate is that, due to COVID there is still probably an 18-month backlog in the court system. One other piece on the loss ratio and I think I shared this with all last quarter and for us it's just one of many data points that we pay attention to and perhaps it's of interest to you all and that's the paid loss ratio. From our perspective, it is an important data point, it's not the whole story, but it is an important data point. So here's a little bit of historical perspective for you again on Q2 and I'm going to give you what the paid loss ratio was going back to 2017 for Q2 that creates as much of a apples-to-apples basis as we can at least using short hand.
The paid loss ratio Q2 in '17 was a 55.9%. In '18, it was a 58.3%. In '19 it was a 53.8%. In 2020, it was a 52.9%. In '21, it was a 44.3% and in '22, it was a 41.9%. So obviously an attractive trend. Doesn't necessarily tell the whole story, but again, from our perspective, a meaningful data point and an encouraging indicator.
Expense ratio again Rich touched on this, we continue to see improvement for a whole host of reasons, certainly lots of folks are focused on it and trying to be more efficient. But the big needle mover is just the growth in the earned premium and as you can see how lags are written there is likely more opportunity there over time. That having been said, we do have a few new operations. We'll have to see how they scale again over time. So 88.6% reported. If you back out the CATs and you do the buck forwards it's an 86.2% on an operating basis, obviously a pretty attractive return by virtually any measure.
Couple of quick comments on the investment portfolio, and again I think Rich summarized it well. So I'm not going to belabor the point too much here but, obviously the duration remains notably short of where our liabilities are at 2.4 years compared to the liabilities give or take four years. I think it's also worth noting, you're just in the early stages of seeing the opportunity for this company and it's earnings power when you saw the book yield climb from in the last quarter, last quarter being Q1, 2.2% up to 2.6% in just a period of 90 days. And new money rate for us these days is certainly north of 4%, probably 4.25% give or take.
We talked at the beginning of the call about foresight and discipline and a variety of other behaviors or traits and the importance of it. I think it is certainly been exercised on the underwriting side, but it is important to recognize how it has been also exercised on the investment side. The earnings power of this economic model going forward in a raising or increasing rate environment should not be underestimated. It's something we've discussed in the past. I think it's something that people have an understanding for when we have the discussion, but I'm not sure if it's fully appreciated what this means for our economic model and again the earnings power of the business as you see interest rates continue to move up. So again, when we look forward, given the opportunities that we have before us, the flow of business coming our way continues to have significant momentum. The opportunity to make sure that we are getting the rate that we want and need continues to be there as well. And of course the leverage that we have that is very much coming our way on the investment income side, I think all these things, position us well for not just the coming quarters, but the coming years, in all likelihood.
So let me pause there. Josh, if we could please open it up for questions.
