Income Taxes (Tables)

12 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2015

The components of income taxes were as follows:



	Year Ended December 31,
	2015			2014			2013
Income tax expense from continuing operations	$	249,894		$	256,603		$	248,110
Shareholders’ equity:
Other comprehensive income (loss)	(411,646		)	424,089			(386,752		)
Tax basis compensation expense (from the exercise of stock options and vesting of restricted stock awards) in excess of amounts recognized for financial reporting purposes	(17,577		)	(18,524		)	(21,314		)
	$	(179,329	)	$	662,168		$	(159,956	)

Income Tax Expense from Continuing Operations

Income tax expense from continuing operations consists of:



	Year Ended December 31,
	2015		2014		2013
Current income tax expense	$	174,284	$	169,319	$	190,406
Deferred income tax expense	75,610		87,284		57,704
	$	249,894	$	256,603	$	248,110

Summary of Effective Income Tax Rate

The effective income tax rate differed from the expected 35% rate as shown below:



	Year Ended December 31,
	2015			%		2014			%		2013			%
Expected income taxes	$	268,165		35.0		$	274,637		35.0		$	264,360		35.0
Increase (reduction) in income taxes resulting from:
Tax-exempt investment income	(3,178		)	(0.4	)	(3,233		)	(0.4	)	(3,107		)	(0.4	)
Low income housing investments	(19,031		)	(2.5	)	(17,541		)	(2.2	)	(16,227		)	(2.1	)
Other	3,938			0.5		2,740			0.4		3,084			0.4
Income tax expense from continuing operations	$	249,894		32.6		$	256,603		32.8		$	248,110		32.9

Significant Portions of Deferred Tax Assets and Deferred Tax Liabilities

The tax effects of temporary differences that gave rise to significant portions of the deferred tax assets and deferred tax liabilities are presented below:



	December 31,
	2015		2014
Deferred tax assets:
Fixed maturity investments	$	16,098	$	12,925
Carryover of tax losses	2,266		3,036
Total gross deferred tax assets	18,364		15,961
Deferred tax liabilities:
Unrealized gains	128,683		522,219
Employee and agent compensation	83,229		74,088
Deferred acquisition costs	921,799		874,817
Future policy benefits, unearned and advance premiums, and policy claims	340,854		331,408
Other liabilities	17,176		4,732
Total gross deferred tax liabilities	1,491,741		1,807,264
Net deferred tax liability	$	1,473,377	$	1,791,303