Listen up peole, don’t be fooled into believing that your “employer’s” benefits are going to protect you and your family.  Most importantly here I’m talking about life insurance.  So many people we talk to say “my job takes care of that” when we ask about their life insurance.  I’m going to offer you several reasons why you are placing your faith over this matter in a leaky bucket.

1.  Many company plans are not transferable.  You leave the job you leave the benefits behind.   
2.  In today’s world many companies get bought or merged.  So, even if your original employer had no intentions of stripping coverages   somewhere down the road, the new parent company may do so.  A great example of a large local company getting bought out is Alcon.  I’m not sure what changes are being made but I had heard rumors that the new owners are not as “generous” as the prior owners.
3.  At the bottom of this entry is an article by Becky Yerak that originally appearred in the Chicago Tribune.  To sum it up Allstate Insurance Company is DROPPING life insurance benefits for retirees.
4.  Aside from a compay voluntarily chosing to do as Allstate is doing, what if you do stay with a company and retire with benefits and then the company goes bankrupt?  Your benefits are gone.
5.  Many “cash value” policies are set to implode.  I read an article about a year ago in the Wall Street Journal pointing out the fact that many cash accumulating policies polices written back in the 80’s had projected potential interest rates that the cash portion would earn that came no where near to being reality.  As a result, since the cash value did not accumulate as expected, once the policy hits a point where to premium payments no longer fully cover the cost of insurance and the payments are subsized by the cash, there will insufficient cash in the account to keep the policy active for very long.  As a result these policies will “implode” and the insured will be faced with having to inject a significant amount of additonal cash to keep the policy active.  Don’t wait until that happens….look into it now and determine an alternative.

Now, here’s where the bigger problem arises.  When you are in your 60’s, 70’s, 80’s or even 90’s you may not even qualify for life insurance. If you do qualify do you really think you will be able to afford it?

Our recommendation is to own your own policy….and don’t wait.  We see people come into the office AFTER they have gotten a bad diagnosis from a doctor.  Life insurance gets more expensive as you get older…don’t wait.

Please contact our office if you have any questions or concerns about life insurance coverage.  Jeff Hollingsworth (our primary life representative) has ove 30 years of experience assisting clients with these needs and he’d be glad to assist you.  Oh, by the way…we have access to over 100 A rated life insurance companies.  We’d be happy to review any coverage you may already have in place.

Below article taken from insurancenewsnet.com

Allstate To Trim Retirement, Insurance Benefits In Cost Cutting

July 15–Northbrook-based Allstate Corp., which has named cost-cutting as one of its top priorities for 2013, is reducing some retirement and life insurance benefits in a move that it says will boost its book value per share by $1.70 to $2.

The changes include a new formula to calculate pensions, as well as ending retiree life insurance benefits for current employees.

Book value generally refers to assets minus liabilities. Allstate’s current book value is about $44 a share.

Allstate also recently announced plans to lay off 348 workers in Woodridge.

Allstate’s stock was trading at $51.17 in mid-day trading on Monday, up 0.1 percent. Since the start of 2013, its stock is up 28.7 percent, slightly lagging the gains of a Standard & Poor’s 500 insurance index.

“The changes we are making to our employee retirement and life insurance benefits bring us more in line with benefits offered in the marketplace and distribute benefits more equally across all employees,” Allstate spokeswoman Laura Strykowski said in a statement. She noted that Allstate provides workers with both a pension and a 401(k) plan.

“Today, just 30 percent of Fortune 100 companies offer both,” she said.