Actuarial concepts in the theory of financing life insurance activities

Abstract

In this paper is presented an attempt by the author to obtain conceptual clarity in the actuarial considerations concerned with financing life insurance schemes, whether private or public, It will, of course, be realized that the author is concerned ultimately with the financing of public or semi-public schemes. However, it is with deliberate intention that the exposition is presented in general terms. As is often the case, abstraction means clarification, thus avoiding a shifting of the meaning of the concepts as one goes from one special situation to another.     

Product price and advice quality: Implications of the commission system in life assurance

The paper examines the implications of the commission system for the price of life assurance products and the quality of advice provided by brokers. The competitive equilibrium is shown to be neither first best nor second best efficient. The sources of the inefficiencies are examined and the effects of policy measures considered.     

Studies in insurance mathematics

Abstract

In the new Rules of Calculation of the Life Insurance Co. Framtiden, the old idea of the continuous mode of payment has been realized. In practice, this method only signifies, that the premium is to be restored for the time elapsed after the moment of death. Theoretically, it makes unnecessary the computation of premiums by the aid of (exact or approximate) yearly, half-yearly, quarterly and monthly annuities, continuous annuities being solely needed. It may perhaps be of interest to give a more detailed account of the method employed.     

Studies in insurance mathematics

Abstract

The question of altering an insurance contract III one or another direction very often occurs to the actuary. There are, however, some points of special interest, connected with this problem, that I should like to emphasize here.     

The level of assurance precision and associated cost demanded when providing continuous online assurance in an environment open to assurance competition

This study uses experimental market and laboratory experiment methodologies to consider the impact of COA precision and associated cost on its demand over extended multi-period timeframes in repetitive decision-making environments open to competition. Results show that more precise COA is demanded both more in amount and consistency over time, including when priced at a slight premium. More precise COA demand is also highly sensitive to pricing and declines dramatically when its price is increased slightly. Discounted less precise COA demand is not sensitive to premium-pricing of higher quality COA. Exit responses validate the experimental behavior captured. Results indicate that COA should be developed as a higher quality service to internal decision-makers, especially considering specific requirements of the Sarbanes–Oxley Act of 2002. High quality COA providers should be aware that premium pricing substantially above that of competing lower quality COA will likely eliminate demand for high quality COA and substantially reduce total COA demand.     

Bundling and quality assurance

With imperfect private monitoring, a firm selling two experience goods can increase both producer and consumer surplus by bundling. Bundling constrains consumers to buy two products, making consumers better informed and ensuring that they use tougher punishment strategies. Both increased monitoring and increased punishment benefit other consumers, so bundling overcomes a free‐rider problem. The social value of bundling is even larger if consumers cannot attribute a negative signal to the specific product that generated it, or if one of the two goods is a durable and the other is a complementary nondurable. Our results are robust to mixed bundling.     

Sustainability assurance provider participation in standard setting

This paper examines the participation of accounting firms in the development of sustainability standards by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB). This study shows that the Big Four accounting firms have an active role in both the submission of comment letters on sustainability to the SEC and participation in the industry working groups (IWG) for the SASB. The SASB participation reveals that individuals located within the US and at international affiliates are participating at earlier career stages. In addition, this paper leverages LinkedIn data, identifying the career path of the individuals subsequent to their participation with the IWG, to determine how large accounting firms are retaining the skills and knowledge necessary for this field. Since the Big Four firms are market leaders in sustainability assurance, the finding that Big Four firms can retain individuals with financial assurance backgrounds differently than individuals with other backgrounds speaks to the unique skill set that financial assurance develops. This suggests that the career opportunities for interested financial assurance individuals within the sustainability sphere remain robust within the Big Four environment.     

Seeking legitimacy for new assurance forms: The case of assurance on sustainability reporting

Based on the development of a more refined conception of legitimacy than has been used in prior audit/assurance and sustainability accounting research, this paper analyses how the legitimation processes adopted by sustainability assurance practitioners in a large professional services firm have co-evolved with and impacted upon their attempts to develop this form of assurance practice - particularly the construction of assurance statements. The analysis reveals a complex and interdependent interplay between attempts at securing pragmatic, moral and cognitive legitimacy with three key constituencies - clients who commission the sustainability assurance services; (socially constructed) non-client users of the assurance statements; and the firm’s internal Risk Department that approves the wording of assurance statements. Securing these types of legitimacy is shown to require the adoption and alignment of varying legitimation strategies according to the constituency practitioners seek to influence. Developing pragmatic legitimacy with clients depends on establishing moral legitimacy with non-client users of assurance statements while securing moral legitimacy with non-client users is contingent on acquiring pragmatic legitimacy with the firm’s internal Risk Department. The practitioners’ legitimation strategies are underpinned by a commitment to opening up dialogue within the assurance process which is evident in their engagement with potential users of assurance and their efforts to expand assurance statement content and encourage user influence over what is assured. This provides a counterpoint to Power’s (1994, 1999) concerns about the tendency for new assurance forms to restrict debate and dialogue and reveals a rare empirical domain where Power’s (2003b) call for more customised and informative narratives in assurance reporting is being heeded.     

网络鉴证业务问题研究

电子商务作为一种新兴的经营方式,给社会生活带来了深层次影响,也引发了对其潜在风险的思考,其中电子商务交易安全性问题尤其突出.为消除这种忧虑,国外采用了注册会计师网络鉴证的方式.由于公众对网络鉴证缺乏认识等人为因素及网络鉴证风险大等网络鉴证自身因素,使得中国顺利实施网络鉴证业务受到影响.本文对这些阻碍因素进行了分析,并就如何促使我国更好地实施网络鉴证业务提出了针对性的建议.     

Management training in futures concepts

There is a growing interest among practising managers in the concepts and applications of technology assessment and futures research, reflected in the thousands of courses, workshops, and seminars in these subjects being offered to middle and upper managers by universities, professional organisations and consultants. The author examines a few of the problems involved in such training, discusses the methods available to solve them, and illustrates the use of two specific techniques-the in-basket and futures-case-study approaches.     

Knowledge spillover from other assurance services

We argue that services which are complimentary and closer aligned to the annual report audit provide greater insight about risk and are more likely to exhibit the existence of economies of scope (knowledge spillover) through a positive association with audit fees. Specifically, we consider the potential for knowledge spillover from the auditing of triennial Long-Term Plans (LTP) to the annual report audit for a large sample of New Zealand municipals over the period 2005–2013. We find the LTP audit fees are positively related to municipal annual report audit fees and other fees (audit of for-profit subsidiaries, non-audit services) are not. This suggests that knowledge spillovers are dependent on the nature of the additional services. We also find evidence of higher fees for private sector auditors for both the annual report and the LTP audit. The LTP (forecast) audit fee is associated with municipal size, complexity, and political competition.     

Quality assurance: The professional's role

How can professionals, especially those in the caring professions, feel confident that the service which they are providing for clients is of an acceptable standard? Any quality assurance programme needs the commitment of professionals.     

An actor-specific guideline for quality assurance in transdisciplinary research

Transdisciplinarity has a long tradition – both in terms of academic discourse and research practice. The proliferation of transdisciplinary research (TDR) has, however, only progressed moderately up until now. The main reason for this is the lack of a generally accepted quality standard for TDR. In addition to meeting the quality standards of excellence of ‘normal science’, TDR is supposed to respond to a variety of societal demands. Establishing a quality standard that incorporates these requirements would only be possible in the long-term as it calls for far reaching changes on both an institutional level as well as that of science as a whole. Building up a practice of quality assurance in TDR today lays the necessary foundation to bring about such changes. The aim of this paper is to present a ready-to-use quality guideline which we intend will contribute to that foundation. The guideline is customized to such TDR that aims to bring specific knowledge to bear on policy issues relating to sustainable development. The guideline addresses three groups of actors: researchers, program mangers or donors and policymakers. It shows these actors what they can do specifically to assure the quality of the transdisciplinary research process.     

Hands-on training in relational database concepts

Accounting has often been criticized for providing summarized information that satisfies only a limited number of information views. Relational database models can facilitate the collection of an extensive amount of disaggregated data beyond what is available in the traditional accounting model. The ability to query the database provides the decision maker with more types of information, while avoiding the overload that can occur when too much information is presented that is irrelevant to the decision process of a certain group. This article presents a simple hands-on illustration in Microsoft Access that can be used in accounting courses to provide students with the fundamentals of using the relational database model in meeting the information needs of organizational decision makers.     

担保事项的会计处理及其审计

担保是指在借贷、买卖、货物运输、加工承揽等经济活动中,债务人或第三人为债权人实现其债权提供保障。担保事项会形成企业潜在的或现时的义务,对企业的财务状况和经营成果可能会产生重大的影响,带来重大风险。而担保事项形成的义务和权利又具有非即时性、间接性和不确定性的特点。因此,对担保事项的会计确认、计量和披露,是会计及审计实务中的一个疑难问题。本文结合《民法通则》《、担保法》和《物权法》等法律规范对此作一探讨。     

ETL开发实施中质量保证的关键步骤

数据仓库项目实施成败的关键因素之一就是数据抽取过程中数据的质量问题。在数据仓库建设过程中，我们不得不在原有的数据中“艰难跋涉”，这些数据来自原有数据库、原有磁带机以及远程的数据源，它们中的大部分都凌乱不堪，并且难以获取。我们要对这些数据进行大量处理，并且还要通过ETL（Extract，Transform Band Load）程序来寻找其中的有用信息。这就要求开发人员必须花费足够的时间来充分研究这些数据，将凌乱的数据规则化，并尽力设计和实现强壮的数据采集和转换过程。如果没有对源数据进行整理和数据标准化等基础工作，很可能造成数据仓库项目的基础不牢。     

Implications of Web assurance services on e-commerce

The ongoing rapid growth in the popularity of the Internet is having a revolutionary impact on the way companies do business. Doing business online has become a necessity, not an option. However, some consumers are not completely comfortable using the Internet for transacting business because of concerns regarding security of their transactions. For these situations, consumer trust and confidence can be enhanced by a Web assurance service such as AICPA Trust Services. Building on prior studies, the study provides comprehensive information on current reporting requirements, differences among Web assurance services, and results of a recent consumer survey to obtain perceptions of Web assurance services. The theoretical foundation of the current study is based on the Assurance Gaps Model [Burke, K. G., Kovar, S. E., & Prenshaw, P. J. (2004). Unraveling the Expectations Gap: An Assurance Gaps Model and illustrative application. Advances in Accounting Behavioral Research, 7, 169–193]. E-business consumers (users of Web assurance services) can be dichotomized into older consumers and younger consumers, who have different expectations based on information asymmetries. Findings indicate that consumers value Web Assurance services, but younger consumers place greater value on these services than older consumers.