All about Actuary

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Actuary
Damage from Hurricane Katrina. Actuaries need to estimate long-term averages of such damage in order to accurately price property insurance.
Occupation
Names	Actuary
Type	Profession
Activity sectors	Insurance, Reinsurance, Pension plans, Social welfare programs
Descripttion
Competencies	Mathematics, analytical skills, business knowledge
Education required	See Credentialing and exams
Fields of employment	Insurance companies, consulting firms, government
Related jobs	Underwriter
Average salary	See Remuneration

An actuary is a business professional who deals with the financial impact of risk and uncertainty. Actuaries have a deep understanding of financial security systems, their reasons for being, their complexity, their mathematics, and the way they work(Trowbridge 1989, p. 7).

Actuaries evaluate the likelihood of events and quantify the contingent outcomes in order to minimize losses, both emotional and financial, associated with uncertain undesirable events. Since many events, such as death, cannot be totally avoided, it is helpful to take measures to minimize their financial impact when they occur. These risks can affect both sides of the balance sheet, and require asset management, liabilitymanagement, and valuation skills. Analytical skills, business knowledge and understanding of human behavior and the vagaries of information systems are required to design and manage programs that control risk (Be An Actuary 2005).

In 2002 & 2009, a Wall Street Journal survey on the best jobs in the United States listed actuary as the second best job, while in previous editions of the list, actuaries had been the top rated job (Lee 2002), (Needleman 2009). . The survey used six key criteria to rank jobs: environment, income, employment outlook, physical demands, security and stress. A similar survey by U.S. News & World Report in 2006 included actuaries among the 25 Best Professions that it expects will be in great demand in the future (Nemko 2006).