Description: Actuaries may soon be required to select assumptions that are individually reasonable when measuring pension obligations. This is the core meaning of a proposed amendment to the Actuarial Standard of Practice #4 in addition to the proposed ASOP on economic assumptions.

Description: The December 2013/January 2014 edition of The Actuary magazine—the Society of Actuaries’ flagship publication.

Description: Chronicles the two-year history of the Committee on Life Insurance Company Valuation Principles, COLICVP, and looks ahead to the future.

Description: This author makes a few suggestions for how the ASB can improve the way it defines and sets standards of practice in light of the challenges actuaries face today. The author believes that ASOP's hould be promulgated by the ASB ony after a thorough process that goes beyond codifying existing practices.

Description: First of a 2 part series: The Actuarial Science Program at the University of Nebraska includes a course on Actuarial Roles and Ethics. In 1978 the students in this class sent a questionnaire to 265 persons, mostly alumni of the Program, aimed at finding out how actuaries see themselves, and to what extent ethical questions have impinged upon them. This article gives answers by 61 Fellows 60 F.S.A.'s and one F.C.A.S.

Description: Discussion as to whether within an organization an actuary's regulatory role can conflict with his business-oriented role or be aligned with the strategic goals of the company.

Description: Discussion of the 1998 Generally Recognized Expense Table GRET and questions pertaining to the acceptable use of the GRET to demonstrate compliance with the NAIC Life Insurance Illustrations Model Regulation.

Description: By definition, actuaries are preeminent in making actuarial analyses. Nevertheless, in some areas, such analyses can be adequately performed by persons from other professions, such as economists and statisticians. This article describes the misuse of life expectancy data by the Heritage Foundation when they 'calculated' that low-income, single African-American males born after 1959 face a negative rate of return from Social Security. Unfortunately, this misinformation was widely disseminated through the news media and Web sites.

Description: Letter from the SOA president describing what he thinks actuaries’ responsibilities to the public are.

Description: In this increasingly global economy, actuaries frequently find themselves in situations involving cross-border practice. This is particularly true for U.S. and Canadian actuaries. This article is about recent agreements and discussions among the U.S. actuarial organizations and the Canadian Institute of Actuaries [CIA] that clarify how the various actuarial standards apply to cross-border activities.