Description: This article is a follow up to an article in the February, 1977 issue of the actuary, which was a discussion of the article, Sex and the Single Table. This article is a reply by Barbara J. Lautzenheiser, FSA, author of Sex and the Single Table, to a comment her original article generated. This current article again provides an excellent explanation of actuarial risk classification practices, and of the legal and social issues used to argue against risk classification, noting that if society does favor policy that overrides risk classification based on gender, such as promoting unisex tables for determining pension payments, then the implications should be understood.

Description: Article discusses the how the older population has been treated throughout history with low regard and often as a burden on society.

Description: Suicide is one of the ten leading causes of death in the United States and the only one of those causes that is trending in the wrong direction over the last 15 years. This article examines several aspects of suicide in the United States with a focus on its impact on the insurance industry. The findings were compiled from publicly available data through the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, from internal RGA data, and also from interviews with topic experts. The article highlights the difference in suicide rates between the general population and the insured population, the proportion of claims from suicide, the spike in suicide rates at the end of the contestability (or exemption period), and current thoughts from counseling experts on prevention. It also demonstrates an increase in suicide rates during times of economic turmoil.

Description: This article uses a fairy tale to tell a story about life annuities and gender.

Description: Part One of a three part discussion of A Social Security System for the 21st Century, this part focuses the broader international, social, political, cultural and economic trends that will govern the viability and sustainability of a social security system in the 21st century.

Description: Highlights of the International Experience Study (IES), a joint research venture of the SOA’s International Section and Research Department, the International Actuarial Association, local actuarial associations and corporate sponsors to provide actuaries around the world with practical experience information in emerging markets.

Description: Can immigration in Europe actually help to mitigate the looming pension crisis.

Description: This paper discusses the marketing implications of the baby boom generation and the aging of the Canadian population in general. From the Actuarial Research Clearing House 1991, Vol.1.

Description: This paper presents a new method for blending census and Medicare mortality rates for the U.S. Decennial Life Tables. From the Actuarial Research Clearing House 1992 Vol. 2 .

Description: This paper presents a general law of mortality that is equal to a mixture of Gompertz, Weibull, Inverse-Gompertz, and Inverse-Weibull survival functions.