TIA's Exam 8 Blog

Hi everyone,

I want to issue a reminder that no new discussion forum posts are allowed after 10PM EST on 10/29.

I also want to say thank you to all of you, as it has been my pleasure teaching this course for the first time.  I really appreciate all the feedback, ideas, and thoughtful questions.  You’ve helped make me a better instructor, and of course I hope that I’ve helped make you much more prepared to pass this exam.

Best of luck on Wednesday, and I hope to see you as Fellows at a CAS meeting in the future!

Thanks,

Josh

Hi everyone,

A while ago several students asked me to re-create past CAS exams only containing material on the current syllabus.  In the interest of time, I posted files that I found that were created for last year’s seminar by prior instructors.  Unfortunately, I did not first review the files, and they contain a number of issues, including questions not on the current syllabus and errors in solutions.  I apologize for the inconvenience and confusion this has caused.

In the interest of creating higher quality material on par with the rest of the current seminar, I just finished re-creating the 2010 exam, consisting of all the questions from the 2010 exams 6 and 9 that are on the current exam 8 syllabus.  This is now posted for you to use as an additional practice exam.  In addition to the 2 new practice exams I’ve created, and the 2012 and 2011 CAS exam 8, this gives you a total of 5 practice exams to prepare for this sitting.  I will not have time to re-do any older exams (i.e., 2005-2009) in time for this coming exam date.    I’ve updated the TIA site to note that the current exams posted in section E for 2005-2009 need to be overhauled.

We are now a week away from the exam.  By now, you should have a very good understanding of the material, and have worked many practice problems.  Over the next week, continue to memorize the material, and work on more practice problems and exams so that when the actual exam comes, it will feel just like more of the same.  Remember I’m still here if you have any further questions about the material, and I’ve been responding to questions on the TIA forum generally within a few hours.

Thanks,

Josh

Hi everyone,

I just made the following corrections.  I haven’t gone back and updated any videos for these, as I don’t plan to change any of the videos at this point.

1.  AAA: 2010 Q1 should have shown as 3 points, not 2.

2.  Miccolis: Re-wrote the solution to 2009 Q18b to be less repetitive.

3.  Mahler 3: Fixed a typo on page 3 of the study guide.  It should have said “y>20″ instead of “x>20″ for f(y).

4.  WC experience rating papers: Clarified that credibility condition 3 does not imply that Z must increase at a decreasing rate.

5.  WC experience rating papers: For 2008 Q23 example in the guide, changed the standard loss ratios in quintiles to be a weighted average of the individual standard loss ratios using standard premium as the weights.  Previously this was a straight average.

6.  Practice Exam 1: Fixed a typo in the solution to Q7.  The coordinate at (0.2,$0k) should have been (0.25,$0k).  The rest of the solution was calculated correctly using the correct coordinate.

7.  Practice Exam 2: For the solution to Q16a, changed the standard loss ratios in quintiles to be a weighted average of the individual standard loss ratios using standard premium as the weights.  Previously this was a straight average.

Thanks,

Josh

Hi everyone,

I just posted a new practice exam.  It should be more challenging than the prior practice exam, and it tests several topics that were not covered in any of the practice problems.  If you have the time, I recommend you take it or at least review it.  At the very least, reviewing the questions and solutions should deepen your understanding of some of the papers on the syllabus.

Thanks,

Josh

Hi everyone,

I hope the studying is going well, as we are now less than 2 weeks from the exam date.  Besides continuing to answer questions, I’m about a third of the way done with a 2nd practice exam.  I plan to have it posted with several days to spare before the exam.  I expect that you will find this new practice exam more challenging than the first practice exam.  Try to set aside enough time in your studying to plan to take this additional practice exam.

Thanks,

Josh

Hi everyone,

I finished posting some new corrections today:

1.  Mahler 2: I clarified on the last page of the guide that dispersion increases when the loss divisor distribution has a heavier tail.  Previously the guide just said when losses have a heavier tail.

2.  Anderson: I re-posted the 2008Q3 video.  I had said extrinsic aliasing meant all trucks were in territory 2, but left out that territory 2 also needed to have only trucks for it be aliasing.

3.  WC experience rating papers: I corrected that B and K (not B and W) decreased with risk size under the 1940 plan.  Added that W increased with risk size, as it still does.

4.  Couret and Venter: I clarified that V_h on the quintiles test formulas is different for the holdout sample than for the analysis data.

5.  NCCI 2: I re-posted the 2009Q21 video.  I had said you divide payroll by 1000 instead of 100, even though I showed the correct result.

Also, I received a few requests to post old CAS exams that were updated to only contain questions on the current syllabus.  As such, I posted what was done from last year’s seminar for the 2005-2010 exams.  For the 2012 and 2011 exams, you can obtain those directly from the CAS website, since all questions from those exams are still on the syllabus.  One caveat that relates to all these exams is that I disagree with some of the solutions, and I won’t have enough time prior to the exam to re-create these exams with solutions that I believe to be more accurate.  Most if not all of these problems will be in the problem sets I’ve created, and in those problem sets I’ve posted the solutions that I believe to be the most appropriate.

For now, I’ll get back to focusing on new practice problems and continuing to answer any questions that you may have about the material.

Thanks,

Josh

Hi everyone,

Today I posted a number of corrections that have come up via student questions over the last few weeks.  They are:

1.  ISO 2012 Q14: Fixed a typo in the solution for the latest year UltAdj.  It should have showed 56,530 but instead showed 56,350.  There was no impact on the rest of the solution.

2.  Gillam & Snader 2 2007 Q35: Added an assumption that I could use actual losses to determine expected retro premium.

3.  Fisher 2010 Q28b: Revised my assumption and re-solved the problem.  The solution is still not ideal, but it is the best I could do with a faulty question.

4.  WC LDD & Excess papers: Corrected the inequality signs for r < lambda < R in the definitions of N_R and L_R in the disappearing deductible section.

5.  Gillam & Snader 1 2000 Q40c: Gave a better example as to why the 3rd credibility criteria is not satisfied.

6.  Gillam & Snader 1 Practice Problem 2: Revised the question, since previously 2 solutions were correct.

7.  Clark paper: Under the credibility measures under the property per risk XL section, I revised the 2nd sentence for the 1st credibility measure to note that the issue I described would occur if you used actual claims, which is why you use expected claims.

8.  Couret & Venter paper: Noted that the credibilities resulting from the credibility procedure vary by class and injury type, not by hazard group and injury type.

9.  Anderson paper: Added 2012 Q4 to the problem set.

At this point, I’m again caught up on errata.  I want to say thank you again for all the great questions that have helped identify these issues, as well as deepened my own understanding of the material.

We are now several weeks away from the exam, and at this point you should be comfortable with the material, and be fully focused on practice problems and memorizing.  Remember to plan your time so you can dedicate enough time to do the practice and memorizing necessary to pass with confidence.  If you still have any questions about the syllabus material, please ask and let’s clear it up for you.

As for me, besides continuing to answer any questions, I’ll now get back to finishing videos of me working problems by hand, and creating some new practice problems for you until the exam date.

Thanks,

Josh