Civil War pensioners still collecting benefits

Further exploring the boundary between genealogy and actuarial science: Despite the fact that the Civil War ended April 9, 1865 (53,630 days ago, for reference), the government is still paying out veterans’ pensions. Records from the Department of Veterans’ Affairs show that two children of Civil War veterans, as of September, are receiving pensions from [...]

Actuarial estimate on civil unions

Not often actuaries get involved in the gay marriage debate, but here’s a snip from an editorial in my old hometown’s newspaper: The more “explanations” we hear about a city committee’s decision to not provide dependent health insurance for employees in civil unions, the more ridiculous this situation becomes. First the Joint Labor/Management Health Care [...]

AAA argues that a benefit cut is not a benefit cut

I’m extremely disappointed. The American Academy of Actuaries is arguing that raising the Social Security retirement age is not a cut in benefits. This comes in a letter to the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, the bipartisan group devising ways to cut the deficit. A few weeks ago, I tossed off this myth [...]

Actuarial tidbits

Stuff I should have posted already: First, David Flandro of Guy Carpenter gives us the chart above to explain the supposed undervaluation of insurance stocks. A lot of insurers are selling below book value. In theory, that should be difficult because one could buy the company, liquidate it and profit. This chart shows that price-to-book [...]

Catching up

Stuff I hadn’t gotten to: Nice summary of IFRS vs. FASB vs. Solvency II. In sports, N.Y. Giants sued by a fan injured at a Jets game. French mutuals express dismay over S-II. Europe: the new Bermuda, says S&P. Medical payments exceed indemnification payments in workers comp for the first time. Fewest deaths on America’s [...]

The public pension crisis

Sobering: If you use the most recent data from government accounting standards, the collective shortfall for state and local governments nationwide appears to be about $1 trillion. If you use corporate accounting standards to estimate the value of those public pensions, however, you come up with a shortfall two and a half times as large [...]

Medicare, Social Security trustees’ reports released

Summary here. Basically, according to the report, it’s Obamacare to the rescue, though all the programs – Social Security, Medicare, and Disability Insurance – need more help. Highlights: Longer term, Medicare funding is better off, thanks to Obamacare. Caveat: the improvement…….. …….. is premised on the assumption that productivity growth in the health care sector [...]

Social Security actuary in rift with boss

Great quote Sunday from the always discreet New York Times, discussing a rift between Social Security’s chief actuary, Stephen C. Goss, and his boss, Michael J. Astrue: Actuaries often run into difficulty because they can deliver an unwelcome analysis that carries great weight. Well, ain’t that the truth? However, says the Times, the current row [...]

Fixing Social Security

On Saturday, thousands of Americans spent a day learning about the nation’s fiscal problems and voted on the following solutions: Raise the limit on taxable earnings so it covers 90% of total earnings. Reduce spending on health care and non-defense discretionary spending by at least 5%. Raise tax rates on corporate income and those earning [...]

Attention, actuaries: To err is human. To cover up, plain dumb.

That appears to be the lesson from Mercer’s monster $500 million settlement of a lawsuit that alleged the pension actuary firm dug a big chunk of the $8.9 billion hole in the state’s pension funds. Most of the reporting over the past few days has focused on the settlement, $390 million larger than any other [...]