Life insurance companies have a long history of overpromising and underdelivering for both just and dishonorable reasons. Carriers justly reduced crediting rates on UL policies while interest rates dropped for 30 years straight. Carriers dishonorably condoned practices like vanishing premium whole life, illustration wars hinged on unsustainable assumptions and pricing structures that conferred undue benefit to the carrier at the expense of the policyholder in the event of underperformance. For these reasons and many others, agents don’t trust the companies they theoretically represent. And consumers don’t either.