I’m an EA and interested in signing up for cryonics. After cryocrastinating for a few years (ok I guess I don’t get to say “after” until I actually sign up), I’ve realized that I should definitely sign up for life insurance, because of the ability to change the beneficiary. I place a low probability on cryonics working right now, but I can claim a charity or a Donor Advised Fund as the beneficiary until I place a sufficient probability on suspension technology working. In the future, I can change it back if I change my mind, etc.
Any issues that might come into this? If no one sees any flaws, I’m committing to sign up for life insurance with this plan in mind by or during the next open thread, and making a more prominent post about this strategy for any EA+Cryonics people.
The main flaw I can think of is that insurance is a money-loser on average—otherwise the people selling it wouldn’t make any money, so they wouldn’t offer it at that price. I can’t immediately find average ratios for life insurance, but typical payouts for medical insurance are 80% of premiums while the figure for property insurance is more like 50%.
In other words, the expected net cost of taking out the insurance policy, if you never decide to redirect it to cryonics or loved ones, is going to be somewhere between 20% and 50% of the premiums. Is that worth it for the extra flexibility it gives you? That’s something only you can decide.
Remember that life insurance, in most jurisdictions, is tax-exempt. As such, the amount of cash your heirs get to put into their pocket may well be higher than with traditional low-risk investments, even if the top-line return is lower.
I sell life insurance as a big part of my day job, and you should be aware that buying a big life insurance policy for charity is the sort of thing life insurance underwriters tend to be a touch suspicious of. It can be done, but they’ll ask for things like your donation history to that charity and why you suddenly feel the need to shower hundreds of thousands of dollars upon them. Insurance applications can be turned down for financial reasons too, not just medical.
Presumably, it would be more efficient to donate the cost of life insurance directly to the beneficiary. People often fund cryonics with insurance because they can’t afford it otherwise, but if you could pay upfront without significantly damaging your quality of life, I’d expect that to be a good idea too.
Well it still costs money, so it will be a constant drain on resources as long as you have life insurance. Which I suppose is fine if the payoff to the charity is worth it as a terminal goal, but I personally feel very weird betting on my own death. (At least in the absence of children or other dependents).
I’m an EA and interested in signing up for cryonics. After cryocrastinating for a few years (ok I guess I don’t get to say “after” until I actually sign up), I’ve realized that I should definitely sign up for life insurance, because of the ability to change the beneficiary. I place a low probability on cryonics working right now, but I can claim a charity or a Donor Advised Fund as the beneficiary until I place a sufficient probability on suspension technology working. In the future, I can change it back if I change my mind, etc.
Any issues that might come into this? If no one sees any flaws, I’m committing to sign up for life insurance with this plan in mind by or during the next open thread, and making a more prominent post about this strategy for any EA+Cryonics people.
The main flaw I can think of is that insurance is a money-loser on average—otherwise the people selling it wouldn’t make any money, so they wouldn’t offer it at that price. I can’t immediately find average ratios for life insurance, but typical payouts for medical insurance are 80% of premiums while the figure for property insurance is more like 50%.
In other words, the expected net cost of taking out the insurance policy, if you never decide to redirect it to cryonics or loved ones, is going to be somewhere between 20% and 50% of the premiums. Is that worth it for the extra flexibility it gives you? That’s something only you can decide.
Remember that life insurance, in most jurisdictions, is tax-exempt. As such, the amount of cash your heirs get to put into their pocket may well be higher than with traditional low-risk investments, even if the top-line return is lower.
I sell life insurance as a big part of my day job, and you should be aware that buying a big life insurance policy for charity is the sort of thing life insurance underwriters tend to be a touch suspicious of. It can be done, but they’ll ask for things like your donation history to that charity and why you suddenly feel the need to shower hundreds of thousands of dollars upon them. Insurance applications can be turned down for financial reasons too, not just medical.
It might be worth looking into which life insurance companies are friendly to cryonics.
Presumably, it would be more efficient to donate the cost of life insurance directly to the beneficiary. People often fund cryonics with insurance because they can’t afford it otherwise, but if you could pay upfront without significantly damaging your quality of life, I’d expect that to be a good idea too.
Well it still costs money, so it will be a constant drain on resources as long as you have life insurance. Which I suppose is fine if the payoff to the charity is worth it as a terminal goal, but I personally feel very weird betting on my own death. (At least in the absence of children or other dependents).