Yet even though we’re mostly on the same page, life insurance ownership in the U.S. is trending down, not up:
- 45 million working Americans do not own any life insurance, including nearly 10 million with dependent children.
- One in four single working parents own no life insurance.
- 75% of households that experienced a premature death without having life insurance report that they are living paycheck to paycheck.
At the same time, people who DO have life insurance primarily get it from their employer. This means employers have an opportunity to play a crucial role in making sure working people understand how important life insurance is to their overall financial wellbeing.
Are you ready to step into this important role? Here are four ways you can get started:
Explain how life insurance is used.
Life insurance can play a critical role in keeping a family afloat when a household’s main bread winner dies prematurely, because the benefit can be used for a verity of services including, but not limited to, estate planning, tax minimization strategies, and for paying off debt.
Assess the life insurance programs you currently offer.
Evaluate the life insurance benefits you offer employees. Will it give them what they need? If not, consider changes or additional coverage that would be most beneficial to and valued by the workforce.
Give employees tools that help them apply life insurance to their daily lives.
Offer educational tools and support to help workers determine how much life insurance they need, given their household’s current assets and annual income, expenses, debt, number of dependents, and more.
Help workers unlock life insurance opportunities outside of your organization.
Provide workers with information about and/or access to life insurance options available outside the workplace, so they can obtain the most appropriate coverage for their specific situation.
Get the latest life insurance research from Guardian
Looking for more information to better inform your employee life insurance decisions? Download “Protecting Those We Love: The Role of Life Insurance in Financial Wellness.” This exclusive research from Guardian outlines the latest trends in life insurance ownership, and explains how employers can play a key role in elevating the importance of this crucial benefit.
