Description: This paper discusses the the continuing cost of health insurance coverage represents a major problem for most of us. However, the long-term continuation of the excess growth rate of the health care economy verses the rest of the economy has the potential makings of a major crisis.

Description: Essay discussing that the two factors that affect healthcare cost are costs and the fact that people lack coverage.

Description: This essay highlights a view that many have for meeting these goals is one of a two-tiered system. The first tier in this system is a universal one controlled by the federal government, while the second tier is a private sector supplementing the first tier. The remainder of this paper will examine this two-tiered system and how various stakeholders in today’s system will be affected.

Description: This paper offers basic, economic and actuarial ideas to improve the balance of cost, access to treatment and quality over time.

Description: The purpose of this paper is to explore a methodology for choosing among techniques for managing contribution volatility in defined- benefit pension plans. A frequently used – and as often criticized – method for managing contribution volatility is to base actuarial cost on smoothed assets. Our goal in this paper is to develop a methodology for measuring and evaluating the quantitative impact of competing asset smoothing policies. We proceed by investigating a series of basic pension metrics, evaluating the characteristics of each using a simulated pension plan. We then use normalized and weighted combinations of these metrics to determine an optimal smoothing policy.

Description: Increasing uncertainties and volatility in financial as well as real goods markets increasingly reveal that controlling systems based on deterministic and pseudo-exact values are insufficiently eligible to manage the business activities. This raises the question how management systems can be modified to generate the adequate management impulses in volatile periods. Risk management deals from identifying, evaluating and aggregating chances and risks, which again determine the potential fluctuation range of relevant performance indicators. Everyday corporate life shows that risk management is considered important; but the corresponding processes to identify, evaluate and report chances and risks are seldom part of established decision criteria. This “paradox” lets assume that risks are managed in various differing and unsystematic ways. The combination of traditional controlling methods and risk management is not primarily a methodological challenge. The behavior of the whole organization, practiced over a long-year period, has to be transferred into a new corporate culture of transparent dealing with chances and risks. This paper describes the necessary change management process, which has to come along with necessary methodological modifications.

Description: Essay suggesting to fix the tax code, reform healthcare regulations, open the industry to competition and reform malpractice litigation.

Description: In this essay, we focus on the “Prospective Solvency Assessment” aspect of the NAIC’s ORSA. This places a spotlight on an insurer’s strategic decision making from a risk and capital management perspective. It requires those in senior management to describe actions they would take to address possible adverse changes in their risk and solvency position, i.e., what they would do to reduce risk, increase capital, and/or adjust the business strategy. We contend that by applying a slightly broader scope than the specific requirements of the NAIC’s ORSA, insurers can develop this into a valuable process to support risk-based decision making. In this essay, we initially consider how to determine which metrics to include in such a process and then discuss some important business requirements and practical challenges for implementing a calculation approach to support it. Part of the essay collection "Risk Metrics for Decision Making and ORSA"

Description: Disease management DM is increasingly encountered in health plans and employer groups as a health care intervention targeted to individuals with chronic diseases chronics. The untested assumption is that without DM, the chronic and non-chronic trends are identical. From Financing Chronic Care Monograph, M-HB05-1.

Description: Established as part of the 1998 Utah State legislative session, the State of Utah's Children's Health Insurance Program CHIP delivers much-needed health insurance to children that are not eligible for Medicaid and who are below certain poverty levels. From Prescription Drugs Monograph, M-HB04-1.