On March 3, Triple-I launched its Chart of the Week, “Girls’s Illustration Amongst Underwriters Elevated.” Citing information from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the chart reveals that the variety of ladies insurance coverage Underwriters elevated by 5 p.c from 56.9 p.c to 61.9 p.c in 2024.
The insurance coverage sector supplied about 3.0 million jobs–or 1.9 p.c of U.S. employment (employees 16 years and over) in 2024. Knowledge from the Bureau of Labor Statistics signifies that 1.7 million employees had been ladies. Since 2012, ladies have comprised about the identical general proportion (about 59 p.c) of the business workforce every year. Nonetheless, the most recent COTW reveals that illustration continues to range throughout occupations. From 2023 to 2024, ladies’s illustration amongst Insurance coverage Clerks decreased 1.4 p.c, from 80.1 p.c to 78.7 p.c. Illustration amongst Insurance coverage Gross sales Brokers decreased 3.8 p.c, from 54.9 p.c to 51.1 p.c.
The typical illustration of girls throughout the U.S. workforce is 47 p.c primarily based on information from households within the Present Inhabitants Survey (CPS), an annual survey of enterprise institutions in non-public business carried out by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).
Life insurance coverage, annuities, and residential and auto insurance coverage sectors are significantly extra gender various than the common business in North America, particularly in entry-level jobs, the place ladies make up two-thirds of the 70% of entry-level employees. In distinction to the abundance of illustration on the backside, the view throughout the highest ranks seems notably completely different. Solely about 22 p.c (lower than 1 in 4) of employees within the C-Suite are ladies, and solely two ladies CEOs head up Fortune 500 insurance coverage firms: Thasunda Brown Duckett, President and Chief Government Officer of TIAA, and Tricia Griffith, President and Chief Government Officer of the Progressive Group of Insurance coverage Firms.
Nonetheless, ladies proceed to show their abilities, willingness to develop, and talent to affect the insurance coverage business in a constructive and forward-thinking manner. In accordance with McKinsey, for each 100 males promoted to managerial positions, 104 ladies are promoted — a lot greater than the 87 ladies promoted throughout all industries. On the board stage, ladies maintain 40 p.c of the seats within the aforementioned business sectors.
Nonetheless, from entry-level to managerial stage, the ladies within the business are predominantly white, with the management pipeline remaining much more closed off to ladies of shade. Just one in 20 senior vice presidents and one in 35 direct stories to CEOs in insurance coverage are ladies of shade. Black ladies comprise greater than 7 p.c of the entry-level insurance coverage workforce, however this quantity plummets alongside the company ladder and falls to just about zero on the C-suite.
There’s proof that ladies as employees within the insurance coverage business return a good distance, as far again as 1797. Their super influence on the business as customers doubtless pivoted in 1839 with particular person American states passing the Married Girls’s Property Act, permitting life insurance coverage proceeds to be handed to a widow with out being topic to the calls for of the husband’s debtors. By 1942, ladies accounted for 30% of whole life insurance coverage gross sales, and simply two years later, ladies had been shopping for 83% extra life insurance coverage than they did in 1942.
Right now, conserving threat administration options simply accessible and tailor-made to the market’s wants is arguably the largest core problem dealing with insurers. Analysis signifies that feminine CEOs amongst U.S. property-casualty insurance coverage firms are related to “decrease insurer insolvency propensity, greater z-score, and decrease customary deviation of return on belongings.” Moreover, information steered that as customers, ladies are likely to spend comparatively extra of their revenue on insurance coverage and have completely different shopper behavioral preferences that will compel a rethinking of insurance coverage worth chains.
Thus, insurers might uncover that fostering an inclusive tradition that welcomes extra ladies into management generally is a quicker path to profitable outcomes. Be part of us on the upcoming JIF 2025 occasion and observe our weblog for extra insights on the way forward for insurance coverage.
