Sad. Embarrassed. Furious. Hopeful.
These are all the emotions I am feeling over an article (link below) that appeared in a new online publication ozy.com. If not for the fact that a reporter contacted me to be interviewed for the article, I am not sure I would ever have known about it. The publication is pretty cool. It tackles interesting topics in an edgy and impressive way.
The reporter was writing about life insurance and Gen Y. He found me, ironically, because of past articles I had written for National Underwriter. It was surprising that he even cared about life insurance given the typical content on this website.
Suspicious that it would be a slam piece, I went for it anyway. Maybe I could shed some light on the true intentions of the industry, and also let him know that there are some life insurance companies who are really aware of the Gen Y gap, and are trying their best to do something about it. Having 30 years of life insurance industry experience under my own belt, I know that there is more good than bad around this industry. I thought (hallucinated) that my portrayal might have made the industry more attractive.
The article turned out to be extremely harsh — a definite slam piece. However, other than attributing a comment to me that I did not make about insurers trying to replace deceased policyholders, nothing else was a lie. If this were a widely read site, it might have done a lot more damage.
It said things like, "The industry is now playing a guilt card hoping that Gen Yers buy policies to repay their parents for all they've done for them."
And, "There's definitely fear tactics used to coerce Millennials to buy insurance that they don't need"*
And (of course), "…Agents are pushing conservative "whole life" and similar investment-linked policies…with returns many financial advisers warn are less than what individuals would get investing on their own due to both performance and expenses."
