Description: An article that talks about discussions between administration policy makers and American Academy of Actuaries representatives.

Description: This articles describes how actuaries can contribute to the understanding of the financing of Medicare and the urgency of its problems.

Description: Two responses to 'Predictive Modeling with Consumer Data' article in the Oct/Nov 2011 issue of The Actuary are critical of the proposal for using consumer data as a health insurance marketing tool.

Description: Two Medicare risk funding provisions that were radically changed by the BBA of 1997 funding variations by geographic area and risk adjustment. Issue No. 36

Description: This paper offers basic, economic and actuarial ideas to improve the balance of cost, access to treatment and quality over time.

Description: Conditions and required solvency standards of federal waiver to PSOs to provide Medicare+Choice products. Effect on providers, beneficiaries and employers. Issue No. 36

Description: Discussion of Ley 100/Law 100 in Colombia, which was ratified in 1993 and linked the government pension plan with a government-sponsored and controlled yet, privatized health plan.

Description: This article, an Honorable Mention Essay for the Society of Actuaries' Entrepreneurial Actuaries Section 2010 Papers Competition, is a discussion of the various issues relating to measurement of data in healthcare. The author presents “a light hearted & tongue-in-cheek take on how healthcare is typically measured, and an entrepreneurial vision for a better world.” Noting that typically data is summarized in deterministic models that produce point estimates for analysis and decision making, the author’s vision presented in the paper “is that of a central repository of actuarially modeled distributions that can either be used as benchmarks or adapted to an organization's experience.”

Description: A discussion of fraud and abuse in the Medicare payment system, and steps to address these problems.

Description: Shannon Brownlee shares her perspectives on the current health care crisis, including: inconsistent treatment patterns across providers and geographic regions, providers lacking evidence-based guidelines, the need for better independent clinical research to establish those guidelines, and the limits to consumerism's potential to fix the crisis.