Description: The 1977 Amendments to the Social Security Act provided for a one-time National Commission on Social Security with broad mandate to study the OASDI and Medicare programs. The author discusses the substantial proposals put forth by the Commission in its report released in January 1981, which would affect both OASDI and Medicare.

Description: This article by the Society of Actuaries Treasurer provides a financial summary of the SOA for 1980-1981, and the financial outlook for 1981-1982.

Description: Name correction to previous article November 1981 The Actuary

Description: This article discusses funding flat-benefit pensions and suggests steps to address what will likely be a future underfunded plan.

Description: The author describes a recent LIMRA study of agent terminations. The article describes the assumptions and methods used in the study, and provides a table comparing the results of this study, called the Brzezinski 1979 Agent Termination Tables, with agent termination rates derived from previous studies.

Description: This article provides comments about questions raised and discussed in the March and May 1981 issues of The Actuary regarding the relative merits of a U.S. Government Actuary post.

Description: The flurry of accounts of three-generation actuarial families having waned pro tem, perhaps I may spark new genealogical interest by reporting the actuarial spanning of four generations. Charlton T. Lewis 1834-1904, my mother's grandfather, became a Fellow of the Actuarial Society of America in October 1889, six months after its formation.

Description: This article is a letter to the SOA’s Director of Education, recounts the writer’s recent experience with the Society’s Speaker Kit, and her address to a school class at a junior high Career Day, noting the youthful audience's attention seemed to fade when talking about ‘insurance in general, the work and the exams,’ but when the talk turned to numbers, the audience became interested and assisted in calculating insurance premiums.

Description: Enterprise risk management (ERM) needs to be seen in perspective of other management priorities and is not first in the hierarchy of corporate needs.

Description: This article is a summary and analysis of the 1977 Annual Reports of the Board of Trustees of the Federal Old-Age and Survivors Insurance and Disability Insurance Trust Funds, of the Federal Hospital Insurance Trust Fund, and the Federal Supplementary Medical Insurance Trust Fund. The author notes that an excellent introduction to these reports may be obtained by reading the Commentary Prepared to Assist in the Reading and Interpretation of the Reports, prepared by A. Haeworth Robertson, Chief Actuary of the Social Security Administration. Note: A more extensive review of the Reports will appear in the Transactions.