A Firm Foundation: How Insurance Supports the Economy

Income Replacement

Life insurance benefits and claims totaled $617 billion in 2015, including life insurance death benefits, annuity benefits, disability benefits and other payouts. The largest payout, $273 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, 2011-2015

($000)

  2011 2012 2013 2014 2015
Death benefits $60,609,925 $61,699,965 $62,537,003 $65,961,376 $72,321,581
Matured endowments, excluding
annual pure endowments		 767,092 415,088 368,210 350,488 397,554
Annuity benefits 70,873,226 70,296,382 74,882,585 69,583,732 73,535,200
Disability, accident and health benefits (1) 104,964,677 107,507,088 110,806,435 113,589,753 115,472,213
Coupons, pure endowment
and similar benefits		 16,075 17,179 17,222 18,992 18,237
Surrender benefits, withdrawals
for life contracts		 237,281,666 245,728,327 248,702,088 281,532,892 272,998,652
Group conversions 27,884 27,891 52,893 28,088 48,382
Interest and adjustments on
deposit type contracts		 9,829,729 7,321,437 8,195,240 7,749,827 8,009,313
Payments on supplementary
contracts with life contingencies		 1,690,841 1,809,677 1,985,919 2,237,030 2,120,777
Increase in aggregate reserve 131,334,694 76,439,405 78,027,832 100,983,247 72,537,076
Total benefits and claims $617,395,809 $571,262,436 $585,575,427 $642,035,425 $617,455,351

(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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