Description: Essay recommending establishing a consistent and actuarially sound foundation for assessing the costs and benefits of each and every current and new Medicare or other healthcare proposal.

Description: People often describe the actuarial profession as dealing with risk. That is true, but in the case of life and health actuaries, another element may be even more important. It is the management of liabilities that accrue over time. For example, the liability associated with a group of individual life insureds increases as the group grows older.

Description: President Smith's speech focuses on the need for actuaries to be better spokepeople and advocates for good sound improvement in social programs like Social Security, Medicare and Health Care reform.