<prompt> Human: An idea to discuss: Why buy life insurance when you can invest the premiums into your own account, and access it as you want?Why not just take the money you would spend on a term life insurance policy, or a whole life policy, and invest it in some reasonable investments with a decent return.You would have some risk early on when your investments were small, but as time went on, you would have a more flexible asset to use, and potentially more money to spend where you need it.  <response>: Life insurance is for protecting your dependents if something were you happen to you. Investing obviously produces better long-term returns than term insurance which doesnt produce returns at all, but if you die in the meanwhile, your dependents are financially screwed...the whole purpose of term insurance is to offload that risk of disaster.Now, whole life is an entirely different matter. Whole life gives horrible returns: unless its for niche estate planning purposes, youre better off switching to term and investing the difference in premiums.TLDR: if you dont have enough assets to self-insure your dependents TODAY, you really need term insurance to cover you until that time. 