Shoppers Seek Bigger Paycheck Protection Annuities

Market volatility increased retirement savers’ and planners’ interest in income annuities in 2021.

Breeze has been trying to get attention for a product that provides what amounts to a fixed paycheck protection annuity, for times when an illness or injury forces the insured to stop working years or decades before the normal retirement date.

The Omaha, Nebraska-based insurance agency sells individual disability insurance and critical illness insurance through the web.

Technically, a disability insurance policy is a health insurance policy. But it pays a fixed amount of benefits per month to an insured who loses the ability to work. For a claimant, a disability insurance policy resembles an annuity for people who are forced to give up working early due to health problems.

Breeze shoppers wanted more disability coverage in 2021 than in 2020, according to a new Breeze quote data analysis.

The average amount of monthly benefits in an individual long-term disability insurance quote search increased 23%, to $3,151.

The average premium increased just 20%, to $1,297.

The average quoted cost of $100 of monthly benefits fell to $41, from $42.

Categories

The premiums quoted depended on the shopper’s age, occupation and location.

A teacher, for example, was quoted an average premium of $744, and a physician was quoted an average premium of $3,027.

Premiums for shoppers ages 18 through 24 averaged just $456 per year. That compares with an average annual premium of $1,644 for shoppers ages 55 through 64.

Location

The annual premiums quoted ranged from $723, in New Mexico, up to more than $1,700, in two states.

For a look at the five states with the highest average individual disability quotes, see the gallery above.

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(Image: Andrey_Popov/Shutterstock)

Allison Bell

Think_Allison