WINNING THE LIFE INSURANCE GAME: HOW YOU CAN GET GOOD PROTECTION AND STILL SAVE MONEY. Brown, J.J. Toronto, Macmillan, c1985. 199pp, cloth, $19.95, ISBN 0-7715-9803-3. CIP Grades 10 and up Reviewed by David Chadwick Volume 14 Number 2 1986 March J.J. Brown, author of nine previous books on life insurance and business, has studied the life insurance industry for forty years. Until recently, Canadians were the world's leading buyers of life insurance. Brown has been a harsh critic of the industry since he first discovered the wide difference in prices for insurance coverage and the large premiums agents earn. Agents earn commissions that often exceed first-year premiums. While competition is fierce and turnover of agents extremely high, the profits are also immense. Consequently, it is not in the agent's or company's interest to disclose the actual cost of protection and rate of return. As a long time critic of the industry, Brown knows most, if not almost all, the arguments that agents use to convince clients to over-insure themselves and to buy anything but real-term insurance. Brown explains the different types of insurance available. He gives graphs and tables in order for readers to calculate the rates available and the costs. He gives specific, step-by-step instructions on how to change your current insurance to a term-savings plan. Brown estimates that the amount of money the average person can save by changing to term-savings to be $500 a year. Only a small percentage of individual life insurance sold each year is of this variety, a tribute to the persuasiveness of the industry. Brown calculates that life insurance could be sold by the federal government, using the income tax forms, with no cost to the national debt and very little extra paperwork. He notes that recently one large Canadian bank and a large trust company both offered free life insurance to clients who switched their RRSP to their respective institutions. A rather telling comment on the actual cost of insurance. All in all, a very convincing and intriguing book. While it will not be popular in business circles, it is a book that should be considered seriously for balance in every library. David Chadwick, Winnipeg, Man.