Who pays the price?

Who pays for the mistakes of others? Very often it's the ones who can afford it the least!  A week or so ago I read a story about a young man age 28 who was driving a mini Van to pick up his two young daughters.

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/ford-windstar-van-defect-allegedly-fatal-crash/story?id=12453337

Because of a design flaw the rear axle broke causing the young man to wreck and die before his daughters got to see him one last time. 

Reading the story you feel a lot of different emotions; anger toward the auto maker and the government, sadness for the girls and their mother, worry for your own family.  Think about it, what would happen to your family if that was you or your spouse in that van?

In the distant future a lawyer will declare victory in some class action suit where the multimillion dollar reward will be cut in half to pay the lawyer, then the rest will be divided up between the 800 or so people that reported accidents caused by the defect.  No, the widow won't be able to depend on that money. 

We can only hope the auto maker pays in some way for this loss but the truth is that the father's life insurance will have to replace his income for the family.  Hopefully he didn't rely solely on the group term life insurance that he has through work.  Hopefully, he and his now widow took a couple of hours to review this possibility with their insurance guy, and they came up with a plan to cover the lost income in the event he died before his time.

Life is short and none of us ever know what is going to happen tomorrow, so always make the last word your loved ones heard as they exit the door, a kind one.  Enjoy your husband, or wife and your children each day, because they are only with us a little while.  Plan for the worst and celebrate everyday that the worst doesn't happen.  And make life insurance a part of your plan!

J