Skip to main content
The Actuary: The magazine of the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries - return to the homepage Logo of The Actuary website
  • Search
  • Visit The Actuary Magazine on Facebook
  • Visit The Actuary Magazine on LinkedIn
  • Visit @TheActuaryMag on Twitter
Visit the website of the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries Logo of the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries

Main navigation

  • News
  • Features
    • General Features
    • Interviews
    • Students
    • Opinion
  • Topics
  • Knowledge
    • Business Skills
    • Careers
    • Events
    • Predictions by The Actuary
    • Whitepapers
    • Moody's - Climate Risk Insurers series
    • Webinars
    • Podcasts
  • Jobs
  • IFoA
    • CEO Comment
    • IFoA News
    • People & Social News
    • President Comment
  • Archive
Quick links:
  • Home
  • The Actuary Issues
  • May 2015
05

Funding pensions and long-term care

Open-access content Wednesday 29th April 2015 — updated 4.50pm, Tuesday 14th April 2020
2

I was amazed and delighted to read in the President's comment (The Actuary, March 2015) the words "integrating the asset and liability issues and not seeing them as independent from each other". I thought such a basic concept, a staple in my student days in the 1950s, had died in the 1990s. Indeed I believe it did, post Gower Report, when regulations came in, led by forces that could understand deposit accounts and daily prices in the stock markets, and could not stretch to long-term dynamic quantities.

The use of daily market prices, quite irrelevant in the assessment of the ability of the assets to match the liabilities, introduces an exaggerated volatility in surpluses and deficits in the accounts of companies, driving investment policy away from the best interests of employers and members. One government minister has described our financial system as "hard-wired to short-termism".

It was good to read, in the same issue of The Actuary, the article written by Ashok Gupta about the Bank of England study. Gupta's final paragraphs sum up the current unsatisfactory position well under the heading "What else can be done?". My only suggestion is to shout louder.

Way back in the 1960s, the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries published a booklet, entitled An Appeal to Statesmanship. It was prompted by the first attempt by government to introduce a state-wage-related supplementary pension. Included was an assertion, and I paraphrase, that we were promising ourselves that our children would pay to us pensions that are far more generous than we were paying to our parents.

Is it not time for our professional body to speak out again, in the public interest?


Victor Hughff 19 March

This article appeared in our May 2015 issue of The Actuary.
Click here to view this issue
Filed in
05

You might also like...

Share
  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • Linked in
  • Mail
  • Print

Latest Jobs

Catastrophe Modelling Analyst - London Market Broker

London, England
£40000 - £50000 per annum
Reference
145925

Senior Catastrophe Analyst

England, London
£65000 - £75000 per annum
Reference
145924

Life Actuary - Financial Reporting - Day Rate contract

Negotiable
Reference
145923
See all jobs »
 
 

Today's top reads

 
 

Sign up to our newsletter

News, jobs and updates

Sign up

Subscribe to The Actuary

Receive the print edition straight to your door

Subscribe
Spread-iPad-slantB-june.png

Topics

  • Data Science
  • Investment
  • Risk & ERM
  • Pensions
  • Environment
  • Soft skills
  • General Insurance
  • Regulation Standards
  • Health care
  • Technology
  • Reinsurance
  • Global
  • Life insurance
​
FOLLOW US
The Actuary on LinkedIn
@TheActuaryMag on Twitter
Facebook: The Actuary Magazine
CONTACT US
The Actuary
Tel: (+44) 020 7880 6200
​

IFoA

About IFoA
Become an actuary
IFoA Events
About membership

Information

Privacy Policy
Terms & Conditions
Cookie Policy
Think Green

Get in touch

Contact us
Advertise with us
Subscribe to The Actuary Magazine
Contribute

The Actuary Jobs

Actuarial job search
Pensions jobs
General insurance jobs
Solvency II jobs

© 2023 The Actuary. The Actuary is published on behalf of the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries by Redactive Publishing Limited. All rights reserved. Reproduction of any part is not allowed without written permission.

Redactive Media Group Ltd, 71-75 Shelton Street, London WC2H 9JQ