I hope you really like Angry Birds….

Chances are, if you’re reading this you’re not dead yet.

—Nick August 22, 2012

If you’re one of the vast majority of adults reading this who is not dead you’ve probably wondered about life insurance…

Well today’s your lucky day because Grand Master J.Rose started a life insurance movement - and it’s going down right now!

Basically a bunch of really great bloggers are going to chat a bit about life insurance today.  And likely because they’ve never read any of my writing, I was invited to join in, too.  So here I go.

I won’t talk about the typical “how much do you need” or “do you need life insurance” stuff.  I’ll just give a little perspective in what turns out to be quite the ramble.  Feel free to skip the bullets if you just want the “point.”

Let’s dig in.

It turns out there are a ton of folks walking around with no life insurance.  In fact, of just the American adults who live in households with incomes between $50,000-$250,000, 52 million don’t have life insurance coverage, according to quote from Genworth over at Mr. Jeffrey’s blog.  On top of that, the average person has only 3.6 years worth of coverage.

Without getting into too many minutiae about the math, let’s just say there are about  237 million adults in the United States and slightly less than half of the households fall in the $50,000 to $250,000 category.  So you have about 52 million adults in only 115 million households who have no insurance.  And those who have insurance have only a few years worth of coverage.

Now let’s talk about smart phones…

• As of this time last year, 35% of American adults owned smart phones (about 83 million people).
• Around that time, the average cost of a smart phone was $135 (I wonder how smart a phone you get for that…).
• We all know iPhones cost a little bit more than that.
• Monthly costs of a smart phone plan ranges from $40 to $100 or even more, now that unlimited data is going the way of the dodo bird for the “big four,” this could go up.  The cheapest plans with the big four were about $60 per month at the beginning of last year, which for some reason a bunch of people (like me) stick to for their cell plans.  The plan is for me to break away from the big 4 but I’ve been hesitant for no good reason….

But I wonder:  How many of the 52 million who make over $50,000 per year do you think have a smart phone they paid at least $135 for and pay $60 per month (or more) for the plan?  My guess is a lot.

I love my iPhone just as much as the next guy (unless the next guy uses an android, in which case I like my iPhone more than the next guy does…) but there are a bunch of people who would rather waste money so they can throw “virtual birds” at “virtual pigs” instead of making sure their family is taken care of if they happen to walk in front of a city bus while trying to beat their high score!  That needs to change.

I hope you really like Angry Birds because your family is likely going to have to “virtually” eat them if you die because you chose the virtual birds over their financial stability…

If you can just downgrade your phone service to save $20 per month you could really set up your family.  I’m an almost-34-year-old guy and am healthy.  I literally just got a 20 year term life insurance quote for $500,000 and the monthly premium was $20.42 if paid annually ($21.32 if paid monthly).  I hope you really like Angry Birds.  Even $1,000,000 for me is only $36.25 per month if paid annually and $38.06 if paid monthly…

Bottom line:  

Anyone with a smart phone can find $20 per month to buy term life insurance.  They just need to get their freakin’ priorities straight.

My Pledge:

If you ever catch me riding the PATH train to work in the morning playing Angry Birds or iJewels on my iPhone make sure to ask me if I’ve let my term life insurance lapse.  If I have, without having already replaced it with a better policy or become self insured, you have permission to follow me for the rest of my commute, singing and dancing like this guy.  That’s my pledge to you.

Who’s in?!?!?!  Who couldn’t find $20 or $40 per month to take care of their family if they died?  How much is HBO these days?

Everyone who has people relying on their income should take this pledge!  This includes almost any husband, wife, mom, dad, or any other person with elderly parents (or other people needing your income to survive) who are not self insured (i.e. have a ton of money to pass along).

Until next time, put your credit card down and slowly step away from the mall!

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Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net