They're not scams per se, it's just their dividend payouts don't really come higher than market returns. Which makes sense then if you just go straight to an index fund. But we don't have those. The closest we have are mutual funds that acts like index funds.

Investment i do believe is something you ought to decouple from insurance. And seeing your answer I just want to emphasize that because your early 30s is the absolute last best time to get a good rate on your premiums so if you need to prioritize, priority should go to insurance (you're likely not to have chronic conditions, so they can't deny you coverage for preexisting etc. You want them on the hook for having to cover your diabetes for example, not give them the opportunity to deny this + you have to pay higher premium because higher risk)