Last month, we reported voluntary new business annualized premium (sales) for 2016 were $7.630 billion, up almost 7 percent over 2015 sales. This column takes a closer look at these results by product line and platform.

Term life was again the top-selling line of business this year, followed by dental, short-term disability (STD), accident and hospital indemnity. The graph (left) shows the mix of sales by line of business.

Life insurance sales overall were up nearly 6 percent in 2016, reaching $2.074 billion. Term accounted for 77 percent of this, and sales for the line were up about 3 percent over 2015. UL/WL sales were up 18 percent in 2016 after a down year in 2015. By product, 48 percent of the UL/WL sales were for universal life products and 52 percent were for whole life.