Why Wouldn’t You Carry Life Insurance?

It absolutely boggles my mind that there are people who can handily afford life insurance but either just don’t buy into the fact that some people die unexpectedly or that their family would be in a hurt without their income.

Using my own situation as an example, my wife and I have always kind of divided the bills into two categories. I pay for the house, the part of the utilities related to my office, life insurance and the ice cream. My bride pays for health insurance, groceries and bills related to the house. We’ve never put a pencil to it, but we guess that I pay about twice as much monthly as she does, roughly how our income goes also.

I have expressed before that I carry a little more life insurance than I really need to just because there are some things my wife and I have had to put off doing because we work full time and are currently raising a granddaughter. If something happens to me there is enough to pay off the house, pay off some investment property and what’s left over would allow her to take as much time off as she wanted and enjoy the things that we weren’t able to get to. While it isn’t necessary, it’s like some of the gifts we’ve given each other over the years. It is simply because I love her and I want her to have everything she would have if I live.

My income needs to be replaced or where my income goes needs to be paid off. The thought of leaving her with all the bills minus two thirds of the income seems insanely short sighted to me. I can tell you that it would put me in a bind to be left without the one third that she provides. She has insurance to cover that possibility also.

So, the question is “why wouldn’t you carry life insurance”? The answer is almost always the expense of it, which coincidentally points out rather clearly just how fragile many family’s finances are. If $30 or $50 or $100 a month is going to tip the boat, what is the loss of one income going to do? And if we truly put priorities where they should be and try to remember that responsibility needs to come before fun, wouldn’t that really free up the budget enough to make sure we’re taking care of what’s really important?

I’ve often wished I was more of an in your face kind of agent because I believe deeply in what I do. I think it would be so appropriate for a husband to have to sit down with their wife and explain to them why they don’t think life insurance is important. How could you look your spouse in the eyes and tell her you don’t care about her and the children enough to budget $100 a month or $50 a month?

Bottom line. I’m just whining a bit I guess. There was a death of a young husband very recently in our town. It always gets to me when I see in the paper that an account has been set up at one of the local banks for the wife and children. That mother should be able to at least know, even though her world has been rocked, financially things will be OK.