RADNOR, September 12 — Lincoln Financial has a number for the gap between what American families believe about life insurance and what they have actually arranged. Its new research, released for Life Insurance Awareness Month, found that 60% of adult children believe their parents hold life insurance coverage, while only 44% of parents say they actually do. That is a 16-percentage-point spread between expectation and reality.
The Radnor-based insurer calls this a “conversation gap” — the space between what relatives assume has been settled and what has been discussed, documented and put in place. And the survey points to something broader than a single missing policy.
It found that 78% of families surveyed said they have not had an in-depth conversation about life insurance at all. Follow the money and the mechanics here are straightforward. A policy that exists only in one generation’s assumptions is not a plan; it is an untested belief.
Lincoln’s research suggests families are also sidestepping retirement income, healthcare costs and legacy planning, leaving those assumptions to surface when circumstances make the discussion harder to avoid.
What Lincoln says is driving the disconnect
“Families often assume these decisions have already been made,” said Darrel Tedrow, executive vice president and president of life insurance and retail shared services at Lincoln Financial. When generations do not talk about “long-term intentions or financial priorities,” he said, those assumptions can leave families feeling unprepared when consequential decisions arrive. The catch is in the sequencing.
Lincoln’s recommendation is a family meeting on financial protection, coverage needs and long-term goals — revisited annually or after significant life changes — with decisions documented and relatives told where the important information is stored. It also suggests weighing life insurance alongside savings, investments and retirement planning rather than treating it as an isolated purchase.
The reasoning is mechanical: retirement income affects how much support an aging parent may need, healthcare costs can alter an inheritance or savings plan, and outstanding debts or income loss change what surviving family members face. On closer reading, the release is thinner than the headline numbers suggest. Lincoln says the findings come from its Consumer Sentiment Tracker, but the release did not provide the sample size, field dates or margin of error.
That does not invalidate the figures. It does mean the 78%, 60% and 44% should be read as the company’s own survey output, not as an independently verified national measure.
Where the conversation is meant to start
Lincoln’s suggested entry point is goals rather than products — what a parent wants retirement to look like, what financial responsibilities would remain if something happened, what each family member believes has already been arranged, and who needs to know where documents are kept. For families who find those discussions difficult, the company recommends bringing in a financial professional who can explain coverage and place it within a broader retirement and savings strategy. “Closing the conversation gap starts with having honest conversations,” Tedrow said.
“When families understand their options and priorities, they can make more informed decisions about the role life insurance plays in their long-term financial security.” He added that the product itself is only part of the exercise. “Life insurance should be part of a family’s overall financial strategy,” Tedrow said.
“With that in mind, the most important part of any strategy is making sure the people it impacts understand it.” What to watch next is whether the gap narrows or simply gets re-measured. Lincoln has put its own tracker behind an annual review recommendation, which means the same survey instrument is positioned to show movement in future years.
The company’s own framing sets the test: not whether families buy more coverage, but whether the 60% who assume their parents are covered and the 44% who report being covered ever end up working from the same set of facts.
