Why Do Life Insurance Premiums Increase? 
The cost of life insurance increases with age . Obviously , the older we get the more likely we are to die , resulting in the life insurance company paying out a claim . In the words of George Lopez , `` Each Birthday is just another year closer to death '' or `` Studies have shown that the more birthdays you have the longer you live '' . The life insurance industry has amassed a large amount of data at what age people die and the cause of death . With a large enough population , they can predict accurately the average age of a man & woman at death , which helps them derive the cost of insurance based on the age of the insured . For example , in a 20-yr level term , they simply average out the cost of insurance for that 20 year span . For a permanent policy , they simply average the cost until the average age of death . So , all life insurance costs increase as we grow older . That is the reason why the premiums for insurance are much cheaper when we are younger . One last consideration ... because the cost of insurance increases , if you purchased a permanent -LRB- eg universal life , variable universal , etc -RRB- and paid only minimum premiums to keep the policy going , you may receive notification that you need to pay a large sum in premium to keep the insurance in force . This occurs when a policy is underfunded or in other words , the policy owner did not pay enough premiums in to the policy over time and it can not sustain the cost to pay out the death benefit . 