Now naturally, defending any large corporation is a difficult task. Since it is a difficult and complex question to answer it probably makes more sense for the average family to simply decide if it works well for them.

Even though a good case could be made that life insurance premiums could and should be lower it's probably still a good purchase for us. Taken down to its basics life insurance enables a large group of people to share in the financial well-being of the individuals in the group. No doubt as the coordinator for the group, insurance companies probably do better than anyone else in the group but they do perform a good service for most of us.

I think that in practical terms it is best for us as consumers do not concentrate on how much profit the typical insurance company makes each year but instead focused one how a life insurance policy will benefit us in spite of the insurance companies.

True, some one does have to die early in order to win but for someone who has a responsible and mature love for another person buying a proper life insurance policy is a brilliant and compassionate decision. The reality is that there are many, many cases where individuals have only paid in to a life insurance policy a matter of a few thousand dollars spread over many years which in the end has benefited the beneficiaries to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars and some times $1 million and more.

Frequently when we speak of life insurance it is in context of marriage and a family. In today's society it is not as frequent that there is one wage earner and the other does not have an outside employment but nevertheless if a couple, if a family has been living on 2 incomes the sudden and unplanned death of one of them will bring financial hardship on the surviving partner.

As with most financial decisions in life we usually come out ahead when we are dealing with individuals as opposed to large impersonal corporations. As we have become more intelligent consumers in the society and take more responsibility for our financial decisions we are less likely to be dependent on the so-called welfare of a large corporation. It is better for us to deal one-on-one with people from our community. This is when local independent insurance agents do the best job.

As to whether life insurance is a big rip-off I guess the answer depends on your point of view. Yes, many insurance companies do make insane profits from year to year but, on the other hand, it's very difficult to turn your back on the concept of sometimes only paying a few hundred dollars in premium payments in exchange for collecting hundreds of thousands of dollars from an insurance company.