Any disallowed religious or political affiliations for an actuary?

I'm just curious if there are any religious or political affiliations which are not allowed, or need to be declared, if you're an actuary? Or indeed if there are any hobbies or activities which would be deemed unacceptable? Just curious!

I'm pretty sure gambling is allowed.... !

 

I am pretty sure you shouldn't be a terrorist!

 

Anything that will get you a criminal record, or be declared bankrupt.

 

Although I'm fairly ignorant in the matter, I believe Islam has an issue with giving interest. Time value of money is a fundamental concept for actuaries and I always wondered what Islamic actuaries had to say on the matter.

 

religion vs actuarial life

lol, good point, but i'm not sure there is really a conflict there.

I think islam frowns on the charging of interest (i'm not sure if that real or nominal), but you're probably ok to be muslim and do a few interest related calculations as part of your day job, don't you think?

I think you can get islam friendly bank accounts, but how many muslims actually manage to avoid receiving and paying interest on anything anyway? And if a rate of interest to cover inflation is allowed, which index should they use? And since inflation can only be known retrospectively, do they have to give back any excess received? And to whom? Its a minefield.

 

what you are talking of is sharia and not islam! I think Sharia is just a way of doing things which need not be a norm in islam!

 

Usury i.e. charging of interest was very unacceptable & forbidden too under Christianity but nowadays I think only excessive charging of interest to the poor is considered wrong.

Interestingly when looking back at the Old Testament it states that usury towards Jews by Jews is unacceptable, but allows it towards non-Jews... ? (Deuteronomy 23:20-21)

 

Interesting article here on the Catholic view of usury over the centuries
http://www.catholic.com/thisrock/1997/9709fea3.asp

 

political affiliations: socialism and development

Back to the main question: Political affiliations for an actuary?

It would be difficult to be a true socialist/developmentalist and study/practice actuarial science because the profession assumes mostly a free market necoclassical economy. Anti-free-marketers (socialists/developmentalists) say that a free market economy will always fail and cannot be applied in most macroeconomic contexts, developmental or otherwise.

In any case, the idea of working for a big corporation as an actuary and earning big cheese is considered frankly a repulsive capitalist pursuit for the true socialist/developmentalist.

 

yes let's get back to the topic

I agree with your post sonny.

 

political affiliations

(Fair point - we've slightly hijacked this thread with some science vs anti-science banter).

I agree morally it would be difficult for a serious lefty to reconcile working for a money chasing corporate giant, but not all actuaries do that do they?

You coud work for the goverment advising on how much pensions to give to nice old folk, could you not?

I think the original question was really more from the angle of whether an extreme political affiliation could be considered by the institute/faculty to be in conflict with the professionalism requirements / actuaries code etc. I guess if the political party/group in question was a legal one, it would be difficult or illegal for them to take action against you for an affiliation with such a party/group.

 

This is the reason why most Indonesian insurers are run by either non-muslim members or they are muslims who are more open to the concept.

 

Usury

Going back to one of the earlier posts, I wonder if this is one of the earliest instances of allowing for credit risk?

The interest (or additional interest, depending on what you take "usury" to mean) might have been intended to reflect the extra risk deemed to be posed by foreigners who might be harder to trace or who might have less respect for Israelite lending agreements.

Or, I suppose it could reflect currency risk?

[Credit risk seems more likely as "credit" appears in 4 books of the Bible, whereas "currency" doesn't appear at all, although "currents" does!]

 

Good explanation, but probably not the case. Religious taboos arise when politics can not resolve an incentive trap. For instance the Jewish and Islamic prohibition of eating pork, was a result of pig keeping benefiting a few at the cost to the majority at some point in ancient history. The few that benefit have the incentive to carry on regardless of the cost to the many- hence the incentive trap.
The taboo against usury has a more obvious origin. It will have been due to the political fallout after some ancient credit expansion and subsequent debt liquidation. A similar thing has happened today. It has benefitted a small number of bankers to undertake reckless lending so that they can underreserve and pay out those reserves as bonuses or inflated wages regardless of consequences for the rest of us. They have no incentive to stop, hence the incentive trap. A similar process will have occured in history leading to a type of institutionalised religious "debt revulsion". Prohibiting usury limits the scope for credit expansion and hence also limits the political problems when it all goes wrong.

 

I find Mike's observation very interesting, it fits.

Non-sequitur & your comment implies the Biblical laws are man-made. The Bible says these laws were given to Israel by GOD to live by after their Exodus from Egypt where they were in slavery. You make speculations about their history & origin of these laws without specifics. That won't do.

 

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Tbh nearly everything is speculation when dealing with events that occured 1000's of years ago. You are even speculating about the existence of God in the above,which seems pretty unlikely to me.
When looking at historical events I always look at who gains and who loses - practical politics

 

Time to stop

I'm sorry. My intention was to make a more actuarial comment to end this thread on a more amicable note, not to stoke up more debate on the topic we've been asked to avoid.

I don't think we'll gain anything by trying to convince people that their views on this topic are wrong. That's not to say it's not important to have these discussions, but internet discussion forums don't seem the most helpful place for them.