Papers and reports

The movement in interest rates and the many and varied shapes taken by the gilt yield curve since the original design of the index have detracted from the usefulness of a single figure to represent the gilt market. There have also been theoretical and practical problems associated with the particular 20-year stock indices, which are discussed further below. Accordingly much thought has been devoted in recent years to more refined computational techniques and also to how extensive the daily presentation in the Financial Times should be.

Proposed standard tables for life office pensioners and annuitants; Mortality of assured lives 1971-74; Mortality of immediate annuitants 1971-74; Mortality of pensioners under life office pension schemes 1971-74; Mortality during 1971-74 of purchasers of retirement annuities under the provisions of the Finance Act, 1956; Mortality of assured lives 1971-74, according to cause of death; Investigation of sickness statistics - individual policies 1974 and 1975

The two studies described in this paper were made as part of a large-scale programme of official research into a series of topics relating to fertility, mortality and migration. The outcome of all this research (including that recorded below) will be published by the Government in due course but the manner and place of publication have not yet been decided. Although the present paper is announced under joint authorship, it is not a fully integrated effort: Part 1 was devised and written by the first-named contributor and Part 2 by the second.