title: Pricing implications of trends in population mortality and underwriting effectiveness.
abstract: Pricing actuaries try to anticipate insured lives mortality rates for decades into the future by considering historic relationships between population and insured lives mortality and trends in population mortality. The degree to which underwriting might decrease insured lives mortality relative to population mortality is of particular importance. A comparison of trends in population and insured mortality is presented to illustrate historic relationships. Two theories for future life expectancy trends are: 1) no foreseeable limit to life expectancy, and 2) life expectancy limited by biological forces. Factors that may increase or decrease the future effectiveness of underwriting are reviewed.
authors.affiliation: Gen Re LifeHealth Financial Centre, P.O. Box 300, 695 East Main Street, Stamford, CT 06904-0300, USA. pokorski@genre.com
authors.forename: Robert J
authors.initials: RJ
authors.lastname: Pokorski
mesh_terms: D000206:Actuarial Analysis; D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D005249:Fees and Charges; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D015273:Insurance Selection Bias; D007352:Insurance, Life / Q000191:economics*; D008017:Life Expectancy / Q000639:trends*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009026:Mortality / Q000639:trends*; D018570:Risk Assessment; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors