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What I Have Learned From My Experiences

Retirement Section News, April 2025

By Anna Rappaport

Photograph of a signpost in a rural setting with blurry mountains in the background that has three direction arrows on it with the words Learn From Yesterday separately, each on a different direction arrow.

The most important lesson I learned is to learn from my experiences, the good and the bad. We learn from our parents and own experiences starting in childhood and progressing through life. I have come to recognize that mishaps are a benefit when I use them to learn how to fix the underlying problems so they will not happen again. The bigger the mishaps, the more important we learn how to avoid them.

My experiences reflect family status and health, housing and lifestyle, my career, my passions, and my friends. My passions include art, professional work, doing good and building friendships.

Awards: My awards helped me realize that what I am doing is valued by many people. Around age 75, I wondered if I was still relevant. Since then, I have won several lifetime achievement awards, and this was very important in keeping me going. In 2024, I was one of seven women chosen as a Trailblazer in Actuarial Science. In 2021, I was chosen for the Society of Actuaries Lifetime Volunteer Award. In 2019, the Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI) chose me for the Lilywhite Award. In 2017, I was chosen for a Lifetime Achievement Award by the PSCA, an employee benefit plan sponsor focused organization. These are examples of recent awards.

Family Status and Health Care

My parents were refugees from Nazi Germany and I grew up in Louisiana. My childhood was difficult for me, because my parents were refugees, because I was a smart girl, and because my neighbors worked in the refineries. My family was uncomfortable and none of us fit in well. My mother taught me how to fight back. We needed at least two years of foreign language to apply for the colleges we chose. When the school offered only one year, she appealed to the school board, and the course was offered. I realized in retrospect that this taught me to deal with difficult situations and to keep going in spite of what happened around me.

I was widowed at age 80 after 10 years as a caregiver. My husband, Peter Plumley declined progressively and was severely limited for five years, housebound for the last year of his life before dying at age 92. He died in 2021 during the COVID epidemic, creating challenges for his medical and personal care. Peter got medical care at home during the last two years of his life. This was very good for both of us. We used a hospice team, and I learned how helpful the hospice and home care people were. I also learned, daily, how scary and challenging it was to be a caregiver.

Housing and Lifestyle

Peter and I lived in Chicago until 2020 and were snowbirds for the last 20 years. We had a second home in Florida and a cottage on a small lake near Chicago. I sold the Chicago home and nearby cottage in 2021 and moved into a Continuing Care Retirement Community or lifecare community in Chicago at the end of 2021. I continued to snowbird and each year reevaluate whether or not to sell my Florida home. Three years later, in 2024, I decided to sell the Florida home and spend my last full winter (2024-2025) there from December through March. For the next year, I rented a small apartment in Florida from mid-January to mid-March.

My Career

Experiences as a Young Adult

From 1958 to 1963, I worked first at an insurance company and then at a consulting firm for several months when I was pregnant, and then I returned to the insurance company. I learned a great deal in that period about the treatment of women, how to build relationships and how to fight back. I also learned about using experiences. I was hired as a clerk in the actuarial department and passed the first three actuarial examinations. After passing the exams, I was admitted to the actuarial program. I also got pregnant while working at insurance company, which had a rule that employees had to stop working after five months of pregnancy. I no longer had a job at insurance company, but I got a temporary position at the consulting firm doing pension valuations. I did not return to the consulting company. Even though the work processes at the consulting firm were excellent and well organized, and women had a strong position in the firm, I was concerned about career advancement. The insurance company rehired me after looking at the evolving role of women in society and changing their rules. The career opportunities were much better because actuarial students were rotated between several functions, giving them a chance to learn about several specialized roles within the company.

During this period, I learned about relationships. The actuarial students played bridge at lunchtime in the cafeteria. The group would get their lunch and then play a few hands of bridge. The bridge games were extremely important because they allowed me to be accepted by my peers. I learned more about the treatment of women and built my skills at fighting back. This was probably my earliest foray into women’s rights and fitting into a business environment as a woman. I learned fast and ended up bumping against a glass ceiling. Glass ceilings were always a fact of life and it was better to learn about them earlier.

Career Progress and Use of Technology

I worked for a small life insurance company from 1963 to 1974. There, I had to do a variety of things, help with the annual statement and valuation, talk to brokers, and participate in product design and pricing. The management were extremely innovative and trying to build a business on the brokerage model. The company was absorbed due to inadequate capital and I moved on.

During my tenure at Standard Security, we used an IBM 1620, an early scientific computer, and a plug-board-driven printer. The 1620 operated using punch cards to transfer information. I learned Fortran and assembler language programming as well as handling the punch cards. The punch cards were challenging to make and handle. I learned to punch them and be very careful with the stack of cards, which could easily be dropped or lost. It was enormously beneficial to see how an entire business functioned and to see a variety of different actuarial areas. This was again a period of very fast learning.

KEY LEARNINGS 1960s: An actuary can analyze a situation from first principles. The actuarial approach is thinking through the money flows—who put money into a financial arrangement and how? When was money paid from the arrangement and to whom? An actuary takes a long-term perspective in thinking through these flows. That long-term thinking is what makes the profession special.

During my time at Standard Security, I learned to address the big picture, and learned to work across many functions: Pricing, accounting and actuarial valuations, product design, and to talk to the sales force. I did these functions for a variety of products. My actuarial background cemented my focus on multiple risks and stakeholders.

KEY LEARNINGS 1970s: I expanded my line of sight to focus on demographics, societal trends, and future change, as well as the consumer and publishing big ideas. I learned more about the challenges women face in large organizations.

I published three major papers[1]:

  • “Consumerism and the Compensation of the Life Insurance Agent,”
  • “The Future Education of the Actuary,” and
  • “The Impact of Social and Demographic Changes on Financial Security Systems.”

In 1973–1976, I moved from the small life insurance company, to a larger insurance company where I had a dream job. I focused on studying the future of the financial services industry and learned much that has helped me ever since. I learned a lot, but some of it was bittersweet. I learned that although a company said it was very favorable for women, glass ceilings were everywhere, and this was no exception. I was also Treasurer of the Society of Actuaries during that period and made many contacts.

In 1976, I joined William M. Mercer, the benefits consulting arm of Marsh and McLennan. This was a shift from life insurance company work to pension consulting.

KEY LEARNINGS 1980s: The same basic principles and risks (death, disability, and retirement) face people regardless of the financial product. I learned to deal with clients and the reality of a large multi-office consulting firm undergoing mergers. I also learned to deal with the reality of women making it in a male-dominated consulting firm with clients where women were increasingly in important positions.

KEY LEARNINGS 1990s: I was very devoted to successful aging and making a difference and wanted to keep contributing as long as I could. I recognized that in addition to the pervasive glass ceiling, there were massive differences in women’s economic security. I wanted to focus on women’s employment and economic security issues and I was passionate about making a difference.

One of the things I did best was making introductions. Networking is vital to success and networks can keep building. The approach of working from first principles worked well in mentoring also.

Long-term projects started in 1995: I have been involved in several major projects that started just before I became president of the SOA. In the early 1990s, the SOA pension research committee recognized that retirement planning and management is split into two distinct phases: Saving money for retirement and using it in retirement. This basic idea underlies the formation of the Committee on Post-Retirement Needs and Risks and the professional work I have done since 1995.

My election in 1997 to my role as president of the SOA was announced at the Dolphin Hotel in Disneyworld in Orlando. I started my year as president in 1998. The SOA held two spring meetings in successive weeks, each specialized. They were in Maui, Hawaii, at the Grand Wailea Hotel, and they were personally and professionally important to me. My family came for one week and Peter’s for the other week. It was a very rapid learning period. My focus was on how I could help the profession, and I arranged several get-togethers with guest speakers and key members of the profession. These meetings were important steps in building relationships between the actuarial profession and outsiders. I applied the lessons I learned from my parents: The importance of family, making a difference, building relationships, and more. I built many contacts, was able to influence the SOA agenda, and was able to help my firm. It was a win-win all around. I was very lucky that my firm supported me throughout my SOA presidency and was a major supporter of the SOA. This was also the start of my phased retirement and I scaled down my work a little. I worked very hard most weeks but took more time off.

The Grand Wailea had the most beautiful suite I had ever seen, a two-bedroom suite with a huge balcony, overlooking the garden, water slide, Botero and more sculpture. The pool was like a waterpark, and there was an area where there were large koi. Both my family and my husband Peter’s were there together for a couple of days and we had a joint family dinner. That was the time when we experienced the largest family gathering of our marriage. All five of our children were there together. Peter’s brother Chris was there with both of his children, and my brother Sam was there with his wife Monica. Jennifer, my daughter was there with baby Mia. Peter’s son Chris was there with baby Taylor. This was a wonderful gathering as Peter and I had been married in a Chicago courthouse. There had not been a family wedding.

My art during this time: Prior to being elected president of the SOA, I was focusing much more time on my art and my expectation was that I would retire and be an artist, doing more art and marketing my work. I was investigating how to get into galleries and considered getting an art agent. I had started to make sketchbooks for major trips and found making these sketchbooks very rewarding. What I learned from creating trip sketchbooks was that my experience of the trip was entirely different if I made a journal including drawings. I see things differently after I have drawn them and remember them better.

KEY LEARNINGS 2000s-Date: The SOA was focused on a variety of risks over the life cycle. My next step in building depth was to focus on major continuing goals:

  • Using a multi-disciplinary approach for research project oversight groups.
  • Working to build relationships between the Society of Actuaries and other professional and academic groups focusing on research and education in retirement matters.
  • Encouraging joint seminars and research shared between the Society of Actuaries and these organizations.
  • Bringing the work of the Society of Actuaries to outside audiences by joining their groups, participating in their meetings, working to get our information on their educational syllabi.
  • Publishing in outside organization publications and trying to get on their boards.

Everything is interconnected. These goals are timeless.

Big lessons of life: These learnings can be generalized. Interdisciplinary approaches are better and having a variety of friends is better. Life is richer if you live in different places and learn different things. Cooking is better if you use a variety of foods. It is better if you publish your work in different places.

Pursuing Passions and Rewarding Work

Moving to The Admiral at the Lake, the lifecare community in Chicago, was a great success for me. It was surprising to see how I transitioned from a caregiving role to moving forward after Peter died. My dreams are part of a very busy and amazing life. I have continued to do writing and presentations for professional audiences, mostly online, except for those I did in Chicago. In 2024, I was honored to be chosen as a Trailblazer in Actuarial Science. This was the first year that a group of women leaders were chosen for this recognition, and I hope the award continues.

A focus on dreams: The Admiral freed me up for focusing on improving my health, art, and professional work. The lifecare community provides transportation and general household support, including basic cleaning and maintenance. It offers independent living, assisted living, and higher levels of support. It provides life enrichment activities, including access to dining, exercise facilities and activities for residents at all levels of care and employees who are also considered members of the community.

The lifecare community also offers a library, common areas, health support, and creative arts. Health support includes assisted living and higher levels of care, and fitness opportunities such as access to a trainer, gym, pool, and exercise classes.

Creative arts: Opportunities for creative arts include visiting museums and opportunities to make art including sketching, painting and fabric arts. Opportunities for music include concerts at the Chicago Symphony, and other venues. In the Admiral, lectures about music, and access to a chorus are available.

In 2024 I had a retrospective exhibit of my art in the gallery at the Admiral. I did a fund raiser for the Admiral art program in connection with the show. The show was a huge success with lots of compliments and nearly $2,000 of funds raised.

Aging well: My big dream is publishing a public version of the material next year and attracting partners for good national distribution. By securing partners for the project, and offering the information to the public, I can help the SOA expand its position in late-in-life planning and research. I have also been using my professional background to provide input to an Aging Well program at the Admiral.

Friendship, Volunteerism and Professional activities

It has been wonderful for me to be able to use my professional expertise to help the people around me. Being in the Admiral has also helped me learn a lot because people tell me about their situations. The experiences with my grandmother, my mother, my husband and myself gave me insights into all generations. Being with many people who have a wide variety of experiences has given me a great deal more knowledge. I learned that personal experience is as important to understanding life events as research or actuarial tables.

I am actively engaged in the Society of Actuaries Aging and Retirement program, and act as a volunteer advisor on many projects and a researcher on some. I continue to write for Retirement Section News and other publications, mostly focusing on publications that reach audiences of interest. I am contracted for two projects with the SOA to be completed in 2025. One of my big dreams is to stay involved and active as long as possible. I plan to write a book about my experience in the next two years.

I serve on the Board of Directors for WISER, the Women’s Institute for a Secure Retirement. I have been able to add value to both the SOA and WISER by having WISER represented on the project oversight groups for women-focused SOA consumer education and research projects. WISER has also partnered with the SOA to help publicize and distribute its work. I learned again in these projects that everyone benefits when an organization partners with others around a common area of interest.

During the period from the early 2000s to now, I shifted from being married and a snowbird going on cruises and enjoying retirement to being a caregiver and a widow. I remained professionally active. I went through a major decline in physical capability and it took a major effort to build it back up. I downscaled professional activity, moved to better-suited housing, and continued to grow and prosper as described above. Remember, the most important thing I learned was the value of learning from my own past experiences—good and bad. Even more important is doing something about it.

I hope my experiences will enable others to build better life plans and move forward at very high ages. I believe that sharing experiences can provide a valuable model and inspiration for others.

Statements of fact and opinions expressed herein are those of the individual authors and are not necessarily those of the Society of Actuaries, the newsletter editors, or the respective authors’ employers.

 

Anna M. Rappaport, FSA, serves as chairperson of the Committee on Post-Retirement Needs and Risks. Anna is a past president of the Society of Actuaries and a past chair of the Aging and Retirement Steering Committee. Anna can be reached at anna.rappaport@gmail.com.

Endnote

[1] Papers published in The Transactions (TSA) of the Society of Actuaries. (Note the NAAJ replaced the Transactions as the forum for publishing scholarly papers by the Society of Actuaries)
“Consumerism and the Compensation of the Life Insurance Agent, “ TSA, January, 1974
Anna M. Rappaport and Peter W. Plumley, “The Education of the Actuary in the Future,” TSA, January, 1975
Anna M. Rappaport and Peter W. Plumley, “The Impact of Social and Economic Changes in Financial Security Systems,” TSA, January, 1978