While polls show people generally understand the value of life insurance, they usually don't have any of their own.
Unfortunately, this may be particularly true of parents. Today, only forty-three percent of married parents have such coverage.
That number drops to twenty-nine percent among divorced, separated or widowed parents, and just twenty percent for single parents.
The reason why may be a lack of clarity about what they need. About two-thirds of consumers have never consulted with a financial advisor about their situations.
Just thirteen percent of all households have seriously shopped for life insurance in the last two years, in large part because people felt they had other financial priorities or thought they couldn't afford the coverage.
This highlights a serious gap between understanding the value of life insurance and actually obtaining it, something the industry as a whole need to tackle head-on.