Description: This presentation is a panel discussion, session 45PD, from the 2004 Spring Meeting of the Society of Actuaries, held June 14-15 in San Antonio, TX. The panelists note that as new channels like the Internet, work-site marketing and direct marketing become more important, understanding the regulatory environment is essential, and nontraditional distribution, direct marketing, direct sales and telemarketing are increasingly subjected to new forms of regulations at the federal, as well as at the state, levels. The speakers cover the legal aspects of e-signature and voice signature, HIPAA authorization requirements, telemarketing rules, such as the federal “Do Not Call” legislation and other privacy issues. Discussion from participants is included. From the Record of Society of Actuaries, Volume 30, No. 2.

Description: This essay highlights a view that many have for meeting these goals is one of a two-tiered system. The first tier in this system is a universal one controlled by the federal government, while the second tier is a private sector supplementing the first tier. The remainder of this paper will examine this two-tiered system and how various stakeholders in today’s system will be affected.

Description: The adoption of FAS 158 forces sponsors of post-employment health benefit plans to consider how to manage the volatility that changes in medical care inflation create in the other postemployment benefits (OPEB) liability. By choosing carefully how the nominal discount rate used for the liability is decomposed into real rates and inflation, I illustrate that the true exposure to an OPEB plan is to the spread of medical care inflation above (or below) the overall inflation rate. The implication is that an effective immunization strategy exists that can eliminate most of the volatility in the OPEB account.

Description: On March 22, 2022, the Wall Street Journal hosted its annual Health Forum, a virtual all-day event which included several sessions. This session was attended by experts across the healthcare space and attendees included many from the healthcare technology companies. This report summarizes the event.

Description: A study of whether tobacco, area and industry rating in one state may be reflecting unintended factors such as race, ethnicity or socioeconomic status. This study does not consider whether the rating factors accurately reflect underlying claims costs.

Description: This report presents the results of a demographic study of Continuing Care Retirement Communities - CCRC. The study presents information on decrement rates by facility & resident payment contract, selection patterns, voluntary withdrawal rates, and length of stay.

Description: Panel discusses the effects of reduced payment levels to many Medicare managed care organizations. From the Record of the Society of Actuaries, Vol. 24, No. 2.

Description: The author gives his opinions of the cause of the health care financing crisis and ever increasing health care costs.

Description: Many Americans will need long term care in future years, yet only 10 percent of those 50 and over have LTC insurance, and public programs are not funded to provide care for all who need it. The Long Term Care Section and the Forecasting and Futurism Section have co-sponsored a Delphi study, code named “Land This Plane,” with a lofty objective: to create a vision for how America ought to deal with the impending Long Term Care crisis. This article describes the results of the study that were available at the time this article was written.