A Firm Foundation: How Insurance Supports the Economy

Income Replacement

Life insurance benefits and claims totaled $697 billion in 2017. This includes life insurance death benefits, annuity benefits, disability benefits and other payouts, and compares with $670 billion in 2016. The largest payout, $309 billion, was for surrender benefits and withdrawals from life insurance contracts made to policyholders who terminated their policies early or withdrew cash from their policies.

Life Insurance Industry Benefits And Claims, 2013-2017

($000)

  2013 2014 2015 2016 2017
Death benefits $62,536,974 $65,961,305 $72,320,822 $73,996,171 $74,942,640
Matured endowments, excluding
annual pure endowments		 368,210 350,488 397,554 420,287 437,591
Annuity benefits 74,882,585 69,583,732 73,535,187 74,769,738 77,043,317
Disability, accident and
health benefits (1)		 110,789,199 113,572,825 115,468,861 120,056,048 126,787,233
Coupons, pure endowment
and similar benefits		 17,222 18,992 18,237 19,509 19,406
Surrender benefits, withdrawals
for life contracts		 248,702,088 281,532,892 272,998,652 265,095,216 308,928,847
Group conversions 52,893 28,088 48,382 30,872 25,719
Interest and adjustments on
deposit type contracts		 8,195,238 7,749,827 8,009,313 9,407,551 8,348,035
Payments on supplementary
contracts with life contingencies		 1,985,919 2,237,030 2,120,777 2,062,662 2,106,523
Increase in aggregate reserve 78,028,839 100,984,602 72,537,331 123,731,601 98,004,386
Total benefits and claims $585,558,162 $642,018,430 $617,451,481 $669,589,655 $696,643,698

(1) Excludes benefits paid by health insurance companies and property/casualty insurance companies.

Source: NAIC data, sourced from S&P Global Market Intelligence, Insurance Information Institute.

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