Description: This article from The Actuary, November 1996, Volume 30, No. 9 discusses the value of the actuary. What is our value to our publics? Is it in sheepishly agreeing with statutory impositions -pension plans are a social good that should have favored status as long as they pay their fair share - or is it in sticking to, then clarifying and explaining, our principles regardless of the penalties? Our corporate agreement with the notion that there are “individually realistic actuarial assumptions.”