Capgemini Study: 70% of Adults Under 40 View Life Insurance as Essential Despite Delaying Major Life Milestones

Nearly 70% of adults under the age of 40 consider life insurance essential for a healthy financial future, according to a Capgemini report shared exclusively with Fortune in September 2025. The study, conducted jointly with LIMRA, surveyed more than 6,100 people aged 18-39 across 18 markets and included input from 200 senior insurance executives in those same markets.

It also incorporated macroeconomic forecasts developed in collaboration with Oxford Economics.

Gen Zers and millennials are delaying major life milestones such as buying a home or becoming a parent, driven by rising housing costs and wages that fail to keep pace with inflation. Samantha Chow, global leader for life insurance, annuities, and benefits sector at Capgemini, told Fortune that these generations will opt for life insurance if it is super cheap or free.

She added that the idea of paying for it while still unable to afford a home does not make sense to them.

“They’re getting married later, having children later, not [making] financial decisions like [buying] a home or something of that nature,” Chow said. The report found that 63% of consumers aged 18-39 have no immediate marriage plans, while 84% of both single and married people in that age group have no immediate plans to have a child.

Chow, who has worked in the insurance industry for more than 25 years, noted that instead, these individuals tend to save more aggressively.

“They tend to either put more away, like in the 401K, or they tend to open up their own type of investment accounts and take that extra money and put it away,” Chow said. A traditional life-insurance policy functions as a financial contract between an individual and an insurance company, where the user makes regular payments in return for death benefits paid to beneficiaries upon the insured's death.

However, Chow highlighted additional features known as living benefits, which allow policyholders to access funds during their lifetime.

Chow shared her own experience, stating that she purchased her first life policy at the age of 21 and later paid almost cash for her first home using cash value from the policy.

“I just pulled it out of the cash value. ” One in 4 consumers are turning down life insurance because the process is too confusing and complex jargon makes policies difficult to understand and use, the Capgemini study showed. Millennials and Gen Z anticipate an average inheritance of $106,000 per person from the $124 trillion Great Wealth Transfer.

In the survey, 40% of respondents ranked life insurance and annuities as the third-most important destination for their inheritance, behind stocks and cash savings. “We don’t educate you at the time that you’re going through your benefit selection,” Chow said, addressing gaps in how the industry communicates options. com on September 15, 2025.

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