Description: This is the final version of the 1989 report on the annual Canadian Institute of Actuaries study of group life mortality experience in Canada.

Description: Mortality rates affect many facets of an actuary’s work. The ability to collect more detailed data and the possibilities presented by more advanced analytical tools influenced the Society of Actuaries to embark on this two-phased project examining the factors affecting retirement mortality. Phase I of the project includes a comprehensive literature search and summary identifying 12 factors linked to mortality experience at or after age 65- age, alcohol, education, gender, health behaviors, income, marital status, obesity, occupation, race & ethnicity, religion and smoking. In Phase II of the project, existing Society of Actuaries experience studies are reviewed to see which factors could be added to the studies. This phase also considers methods for reflecting the additional factors in the mortality tables. This web page contains links to the Phase I and Phase II reports and supporting documentation.

Description: This paper is the final report in a project commissioned by the Society of Actuaries Social Security Committee. The paper considers a variety of possible risk classification factors that could be used in estimating the value of any mortality based benefit for retirees. As many countries consider mandatory individual retirement accounts as their answer to a secure Social Security system, the question arises as to whether all workers can get true 'market value' annuities when they retire. It is clear today that private sector life annuities are priced assuming that the applicant is healthy-very healthy. Very little underwriting or risk classification now exists in the individual annuity marketplace. This paper reviews 45 recent research papers that look at factors that affect mortality after retirement. In particular, factors that seem to be important in predicting retirement mortality include: age, gender, race and ethnicity, education, income, occupation, marital status, religion, health behaviors, smoking, alcohol, and obesity. For each factor, this paper gives highlights relative to the named factor of the impact expected from that variable as described in the 45 reviewed research papers.

Description: In this paper the authors discuss the official decennial Unites States Life Tables for 1979-81, presenting age-specific mortality rates and expectations of life. Mortality trends are examined going back to the first decennial tables published at the beginning of the century, and brief comparisons with mortality in other industrialized countries are made. The paper includes written discussion. From the 1985 Transactions Vol. 37.

Description: In the past few years, SoA members and leaders have raised questions about future needs for actuarial skills, globalization of markets, and the appropriate focus of the present education system in preparing actuaries for their professional futures. As a consequence of these questions, the SoA Board of Governors set aside a major portion of its January 1994 meeting to discuss the education of actuaries, with primary consideration being given to a longer horizon than the immediate future. Chris Daykin, representing the Institute of Actuaries, reported that the Institute was incorporating fundamental changes to its basic Education and Examination [E&E] system. These changes were aimed at focusing more on fundamental principles and away from details of practice.

Description: Paper provides an overview of the impacts of population aging on the design and marketing of group life and health and group pension products over the next 40 years. While the paper is written with a group focus, the implications of the material for individual product design and marketing are immediately obvious and equally important. From the Transactions of Society of Actuaries 1994, Vol. 46.

Description: The author offers his proof that an annuity for the life expectancy exceeds a life annuity.

Description: Enhanced or impaired annuities are life annuities underwritten to reflect annuitants' actual mortality. They are not currently prevalent in the U.S. or Canada, where life annuities assume low mortality and are thus unfair for impaired lives. This paper looks at the present annuity marketplace in the United States and Canada. It also reviews the underwriting and marketing of life annuities in the United Kingdom where “enhanced” life annuities are available for a broader cross section of the marketplace. It also reviews the use of P&C risk classification techniques and how they might apply to the annuity marketplace as well as potential legal constraints on broader risk classification for life annuities.

Description: This paper examines the following three questions by reviewing literature that identifies and evaluates the tradeoffs among annuitization and self-managed drawdown strategies: 1. How DO Retirees Draw Down their Financial Savings? 2. How COULD Retirees Draw Down their Financial Savings? 3. How SHOULD Retirees Draw Down their Financial Savings?

Description: Presents a theoretical basis for a computerized methodology for estimating biological age - a measure of time to death.