• Nevertheless, an insurable person today can generally buy permanent insurance at apparently lower cost than ever before.
• How has this been achieved?
  • It has been accomplished by mercilessly squeezing profit margins, by assuming recent lapse experience to be a passing phase, by swallowing mortality declines as quickly as they appear, by weakening valuation and non-forfeiture standards, and by invading traditional field compensation. We have introduced non-guaranteed premiums, we have designed interest-sensitive, universal and variable products, and soon a combination of all these innovations may sweep the market.
• Yet the downward pressure on premiums continues.
• If our product objective must be to offer minimum-cost guaranteed premium, permanent insurance, then funding even low cash values and hence providing for the resulting C-3 risk may not be the best approach.

1984 09 - The Actuary - The Case for Policies Without Guaranteed Cash Values, by Lorne Campbell - 3p