Disability Insurance: Are You Covered?
What people mostly imagine under ‘disability’ is the loss of mobility after a sudden accident related either to work or sport. However, just look at the statistical figures and you will see that accidents are responsible for only about a half the amount of handicapped people than serious diseases such as cancer, diabetes or heart diseases.
Your chances of becoming handicapped
If you are younger than 65, your chances of becoming long-term handicapped due to an accident or sickness are double than the chances that you will pass away because of these causes. But naturally with growing age, also the chances that a person will become handicapped are increasing:
* 3% of children younger than 14 years become handicapped
* 4% of young people between 15 and 24 years become handicapped
* out of every 100 adults between 25 – 44 years, 7 are handicapped
* 17% of adults between 45 and 64 years become handicapped
* 40 in 100 adults 65 and over become handicapped
* 53 in 100 adults over 75 reported disability
The current numbers tell us that right now, about 14% of Canadians are classified as handicapped, which is some 4.4 million in real numbers.
What can you await when you sign up for disability insurance?
There are different people who have different needs and get into different situations, therefore the selection of different types of insurance is quite rich. Life insurance is aimed at such situations where the death of a person means a hard period for his/her family – not only emotionally, but also because of the unexpected loss of financial income. On the other hand, in case a person turns (totally) handicapped, he/she and the whole family faces two serious problems: one is the missing money from the job the person is usually not able to keep, ane the other issue is the need for special medical and other care, which can also be very costly. So we can see that a good disability insurance can help you solve even more problems than a life insurance. Being classed as handicapped doesn’t always mean that the person is not able of some kind of employment (see the different definitions of disability), but it has been reported that around 15% of those filing for bankruptcy have done it due to illness or accident. As handicapped, you are eligible to receive some government benefits, but they are very limited. The coverage group plans usually cover only 50% to 60% of a person’s net income, so they cannot really match the current wages either.
So now you might be thinking – is it a good idea to sign up for disability insurance, or not? First think about your possibilities – if you suddenly cannot earn enough money…
You could:
* rely on your spouse/family income
* spend your savings or retirement funds
* sell your property or other assets
* get a credit
* have a reliable disability insurance that covers your missing income
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