Description: We suggest a new method of latent variable analysis and apply it for describing mortality changes in developed countries over the period of 1900--2014.

Description: Discusses notation deficiencies.

Description: This article is a summary of the roundtable discussion with a group of panelists on how to appropriately measure public pension plan liabilities. The crux of the debate is whether public pension plans should disclose a market value of liability - MVL - or whether current disclosures are adequate.

Description: This session exams the SOA Long-Term Care Valuation Table Committee's progress on valuation, reserve adequacy & regulatory issues as well as table construction and implementation. From the Record of the Society of Actuaries, Volume 27, No. 1, Session 97

Description: Summary of the recommendations of the Society of Actuaries Mortality Study Working Group, whose purpose was to re-evaluate the scope and content of the Society’s mortality experience studies and to develop long term strategic direction.

Description: Abstract: The percentage of the population who are obese has grown dramatically worldwide over the last several decades, although stabilizing recently in the United States. Studies have found the effects on mortality to be inconsistent and controversial because of methodological differences and the complexity of the relationship between obesity and mortality. This paper discusses this relationship and sheds light on the likely effects of this epidemic. Issues associated with the so-called obesity-mortality paradox, where mortality experience is lower for those individuals who are overweight and in some who are obese compared with the mortality of those in the normal weight category, are examined. Although certain recently reported studies of the relationship between mortality and obesity indicate that obesity is related to a reduced percent of additional mortality, this may in part be due to the shorter average time that those currently obese have been exposed to their condition. Nevertheless, the amount of health care costs and rates of disability associated with being obese are significant, contributing to the increase in overall health care costs as they become more numerous and age. Although obesity is being addressed with a great deal of activity and publicity, they will continue to prove challenging for individuals and society to manage and overcome.

Description: Identifies current trends and considerations when setting the mortality improvement assumption for individual life insurance in the US.

Description: Discussion papers on a paper dealing with minimum statutory nonforfeiture values for retirement annuity contracts.

Description: A description of current council member areas of responsibility, Life & Annuity Symposium sessions to be sponsored, and other future projects.

Description: This article gives examples of how an actuary can live by the actuarial motto of substituting facts for appearances. The specific examples given are setting the mortality for table shaved individual life business and setting late duration lapse assumptions for level term business.