Description: 1993 SOA Spring Meeting, San Diego. This session discussed the proposed standards for determining the economic assumptions for the purposes of measuring pension obligations. The actuary's determination of the interest rate assumption was the primary focus of the discussion.

Description: This research, based on data from regulatory filings in Ontario, with supplementary information from British Columbia and the United States, examines funding valuation discount rates.

Description: This paper presents a history of traditional topics like actuarial cost methods and assumptions, the history of past inquiries into the dynamic and stochastic nature of pension costs, and the perceptions and concerns of pension actuaries of the past. From The Future of Pension Plan Funding and Disclosure Monograph, M-RS05-1.

Description: These discussions at the 1967 New York and New Orleans Regional Meetings are about considerations in choosing interest assumptions and challenges presented when comparing investment yields among companies.

Description: An article presenting updated results as of 12/2021 by using analgorithm that formed part of a paper presented at the AFIR-ERMColloquium which took place in Panama, in 2017. This article starts by proving that the conditions that have to be met in order for the formula to apply that were present in 12/2015 still hold.

Description: A discussion of the various Pension Plan Asset Valuation Methods. FromThe Pension Forum, August 2001, Volume 13, Issue No. 1.

Description: This discussion at a 1967 Regional Meeting is about methods of allocating investment income using the investment year method, the treatment of unrealized capital gains, considerations in choosing interest assumptions, and challenges presented when comparing investment yields among companies.

Description: Panelists discuss: [1] latest trends in mortality and regulatory environment applicable to mortality tables, [2] turnover assumptions, and [3] Actuarial Standards of Practice [ASOPs] that apply to the choosing and setting of demographic assumptions. From the 2002 Record of Society of Actuaries, Volume 28, No. 2. Session 63PD of the San Francisco Spring Meeting.

Description: 1994 SOA Meeting, San Antonio. This session covered the SEC letter on FAS 87, discount rates analyzing the current yield curve, matching bond portfolios to benefit payments, selection of salary scale, selection of return on assets, update on ASB proposed standards, and the relationship, if any, of funding assumptions to accounting assumptions.

Description: This paper deals with the selection of appropriate interest and inflation assumptions, which is one of the most important considerations in the valuation of a defined benefit pension plan. The paper begins by describing a simplified model in which the only important consideration is the selection of an appropriate differential between interest and inflation assumptions. The discussion then considers some situations that might lead the actuary to attempt to select a realistic level of interest and inflation assumptions, in addition to an appropriate differential. The author's conclusion is that in some situations the absolute level of the interest and inflation assumptions can be all but meaningless, and the differential between the two assumptions is the important factor. In other situations the use of this technique will produce serious inaccuracies in the valuation results. As always, the actuary must analyze each situation in order to determine which of the available techniques will produce the best results with the least effort, given the degree of accuracy required. From Transactions of Society of Actuaries 1976, Vol. 28.