Modelling Life

As I was browsing through ITunes, I came across the Actuary Song, taken from the musical “I Love You Because”. Well, I had no idea there was an actuary song, as you can imagine. It turned out there were actuary two others songs on ITunes about actuaries. But I will focus for the moment on the Actuary Song. The Actuary Song is about a girl Marcie who broke up with her boyfriend and her friend Diana gives her some advice about finding Mr Right. I have lived happily as an actuary now for a number of years and I had never heard actuarial principles were used on the dating scene. If only I had known this, maybe I could have applied some of my mathematical skills to assess the likelihood of certain relationships. So here is what I learnt from the Actuary Song... The Rebound Time (RT), that is the time (in years) you need before you start another long-term relationship, depends on the Relationship Length (RL) of the previous relationship. The first year is worth 6 months of RT, the next is ...

I was reading this most random story about president Barack Obama receiving an insurance policy in the event of a crocodile attack as he travels to Darwin in the Northern Territories of Australia. President Barack Obama's family will receive a $50,000 benefit if the most powerful man on planet Earth gets eaten by crocodile. How comforting is this! The man is probably insured for millions in the event of death. But they will get an extra 50K for a crocodile attack. The article added that "the policy was designed to give Mr Obama's family peace of mind." An official said: "For Michelle and the kids they can be comforted if a terrible event did occur then $50,000 would be payed out by TIO to help support them." Here is my question: how do $50,000 give you peace of mind when you lose a husband? I don't know about you, but I would have peace of mind up until the moment some random insurance company tells me I could be eaten by a crocodile. Then I would th...