Have you ever had to miss work because of illness? Most employed and self-employed Americans have an occasional negative health incident that lasts a few days, so they “call in” sick and hopefully their paycheck is not impacted, as personal time off or sick pay covers one for those days. But are you financially prepared if your disability were to last weeks, months or even years? There is a pretty good chance that most people cannot even imagine being disabled for more than a few days; therefore, The Council for Disability Awareness(The CDA) wants you to know May is Disability Insurance Awareness Month.
Let’s do a Reality Checkup
As part of the 2018 Disability Insurance Awareness Month (DIAM), The CDA created the RealityCheckup campaign. According to The CDA:
“The first goal of the campaign is to encourage people to take the time to consider the reality of missing work — and a paycheck — for any period of time, and to understand that it happens more than any of us would like to think. The second goal is to help people identify the steps to insure themselves against this possibility. Each individual’s approach and solution will be different, but we want everyone to understand that some form of insurance coverage is a critical part of a responsible financial plan.”
Here are some statistics compiled by the American Council of Life Insurers(ACLI) and other organizations for you to consider:
- At least 51 million working adults in the United States are without disability insurance other than the basic coverage available through Social Security.
- Only 48 percent of American adults indicate they have enough savings to cover three months of living expenses in the event they’re not earning any income.
- Almost half of American adults indicate they can’t pay an unexpected $400 bill without having to take out a loan or sell something to do so.
Short-term disability claims most often result from pregnancy, musculoskeletal disorders, digestive disorders, mental health disorders, and injuries including sprains, muscle strains and fractures. Long-term disability claims can also result from pregnancy, mental health issues, injuries, and musculoskeletal disorders; however, cancer is the cause of 15% of all long-term disability claims.
It is also important to remember that Workers’ Compensation and Social Security’s Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) will cover some disabilities. However, Workers’ Compensation only comes into play if the disabling injury or illness occurs as a result of work related incidents. Also, from 2006-2015, only 34% of SSDI claimants’ applications were approved.
The CDA advises everyone to be prepared by creating a Disability Security Plan.
Disability Insurance Awareness Month is a time to take action
If you have some time this month, we suggest that you take action and learn what you can about disability insurance. The Insurance Information Institute (III) has three helpful articles that provide a good overview:
- What are the types of disability insurance? – Short-Term Disability (STD) and Long-Term Disability (LTD)
- Will my employer provide disability coverage?
- Buying disability insurance
It’s true what people say, “Life Happens!”
John Bailey Insurance Agency is here to protect your greatest asset – YOU
You may remember last month we published a post about Key Person Insurance and we talked about the importance of both key person life insurance and key person disability insurance. We work closely with our commercial business clients reviewing their insurance policies, including disability insurance. If you have questions about disability insurance coverage, we invite you to contact our John Bailey Insurance Agency team.
Insure a great life…