Description: This article highlights the Late-in-Life Decisions Guide recently published by the SOA. It includes interviews with three retirement professionals.

Description: Demographic challenges due to longevity increases and low fertility rates will lower economic growth as measured by GDP. By deconstructing GDP growth between population and productivity growth the article describes the problem and presents potential solutions. The article builds off an SOA research paper published in November 2023, Demographics and Productivity: Drivers of Economic Growth.

Description: This article provides a summary of the research paper and Excel-based tool that can be found on the SOA’s website at Regulatory Capital Adequacy for Life Insurance Companies: A Comparison of Four Jurisdictions | SOA.

Description: The SOA Research Institute tasked the Workforce Science Institute to investigate how retirement benefit plans can affect a plan sponsor’s workforce and business results. The following is an interview with Rick Guzzo and Haig Nalbantian co-founders of the Workforce Science Institute who are the researchers on this project. The interview gives a helicopter view of the project as well as provides some “food for thought” on how retirement plans can be designed to produce an effective workforce.

Description: This article offers an overview of the Indian insurance industry, highlighting its structure, growth, outlook for actuaries, and ambitious goals for achieving universal insurance coverage in India.

Description: A detailed look at charges to the FSA pathway in the GI track that is planned for 2023.

Description: Lifetime pension pools convert a lump sum into lifelong income, periodically adjusting benefit payouts based on mortality and investment experience. Volatility-targeting strategies can enhance benefit stability by dynamically adjusting the investment portfolio’s exposure to risky assets in the context of these pools, demonstrating superior performance compared to traditional static asset allocation methods.

Description: As actuaries in health care, we spend most of our time focused on reviewing claims, enrollment and clinical data. That information is captured while patients are in health care facilities. Yet most people spend only a small fraction of their time in these facilities. This article explores what types of data are available to actuaries the provide a more holistic view of the member so that a members physical and emotional needs, the social determinants of health can be taken into consideration along with their clinical needs. Two uses cases are presented so actuaries can see how these types of analyses can be leveraged to improve clinical, operational, and financial performance of risk bearing health entities. Understanding the customer (member) not just the patient enables actuaries to provide new insights and values to our stakeholders across a wide range of business and risk applications.

Description: As product development professionals, we know that getting customer feedback is a key component of the product development process. If crafted carefully, these sessions can uncover true unmet needs, unlock the next product innovation, and create market share gains, all while creating something that contributes to society. As quoted during one of our last focus groups, “Magic stuff happens here.” When designing your research, are you doing all that you can to promote inclusive thinking? By focusing on the design of your study—through overall theme and by paying attention to the details in the process—you can uncover new perspectives that you may not have considered, if not for being deliberate in your actions. Instead of just avoiding structures that create biases, we need to actively incorporate inclusivity. Our team performed a study titled “Designing Solutions to Empower Women,” which focused on women’s viewpoints and how those could be incorporated into life insurance product development. I would love to share some of my experiences and tips collected along the way.

Description: This update column from ACLI the “General Explanations of the Administration’s Revenue Proposals for Fiscal Year 2022” (Green Book).