Why does less than half the UK population have life insurance cover?

More than 50% of the UK population do not have any form of life insurance

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cover, says Swiss Re, one of the world's largest insurance companies. In their latest annual report they estimate that an additional £2.4 trillion of insurance cover would be needed to bridge that gap.

But in practice the gap is not that big. Firstly, there's the people who are ruled out from having life insurance due to their age - 1 in 6 people are aged over 65 and effectively uninsurable, and just over 1 in 5 are aged under 18, the minimum qualifying age for life insurance cover. Then there's a raft of single people aged between 18 and 65, who have no dependents and for whom life insurance is quite unnecessary. Having said that, there's no doubt that there are still many families out there who desperately need life insurance but who don't have cover.

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So what's holding them back?

There are still lots of people who simply don't understand what life insurance does and because it's never top of their minds, nothing ever gets done. Then ( best mortgages ) here's apathy. Life insurance isn't exactly a pleasurable buy, there's no window-shopping or thrill in the purchase. So the probability is that unless a financial adviser sits down in front of these people and talks about life insurance, they'll remain uninterested and uninsured.

Then there are the people who know they need life insurance but say they can't afford it. But for many, "can't afford" actually means "I choose not to afford". They might be ( home insurance ) happy to spend £3,000 a year on a 30 a day smoking habit but won't cut back to pay for a monthly premium that protects their family's future.

There is no disputing the fact that some people have applied for life insurance and genuinely found the final premium offered, totally unaffordable. For the majority, life insurance at standard rates is fine but over the last seven years there has been a huge rise in ( cheap car insurance ) the number of people who are paying loaded premiums. It's due to the life insurance companies making it increasingly difficult for people to meet their definition of being "healthy". Today, twice as many people as there were seven years ago, are being charged higher premiums because the insurance companies rate them as an above average ( medical insurance ) health risk.

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