Now that your children are self-supporting, you may feel you no longer need the life insurance policy you bought when they were babies. But if you are like many families, you may have wiped out your savings to put your kids through college. Now you need to begin saving aggressively for retirement. Life insurance can be an important part of a retirement savings program.

At this point you may have 10 or 20 more years of an active working life left. These are likely to be the most productive and highest-earning years of your life. What would happen if you died suddenly? Your spouse, deprived of the benefits of your most productive years, could be forced to drastically cut back on his or her retirement plans. Life insurance proceeds, invested wisely, could provide your spouse a stream of income for several decades.

Life insurance can also ensure your spouse is not saddled with debts if you should die prematurely. In the past, a family’s home mortgage was largely paid down by the time the kids were in college. But nowadays many people have cashed out some or all of the equity from their homes to finance a better lifestyle or perhaps a second home. Life insurance can ensure that your spouse can continue to live in the style to which he or she has become accustomed.