Since 2001 Stephen Goss has served as the Chief Actuary of the Social Security Administration, which most people are probably unaware of, but more importantly than who the Chief Actuary is may be what the Chief Actuary does.
The position of Chief Actuary, which reports directly to Social Security’s commissioner, is actually a pretty important position that provides estimates and analysis of Social Security’s programs and trust funds. Below is Social Security’s description of the Chief Actuary.
The Office of the Chief Actuary plans and directs a program of actuarial estimates and analyses relating to SSA-administered retirement, survivors and disability insurance programs and to proposed changes in those programs. It evaluates operations of the Federal Old-Age and Survivors Insurance Trust Fund and the Federal Disability Insurance Trust Fund, conducts studies of program financing, performs actuarial and demographic research on social insurance and related program issues, and projects future workloads.
In addition, the Office is charged with conducting cost analyses relating to the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program, a general-revenue financed, means-tested program for low-income aged, blind and disabled people. The Office provides technical and consultative services to the Commissioner, to the Board of Trustees of the Social Security Trust Funds, and its staff appears before Congressional Committees to provide expert testimony on the actuarial aspects of Social Security issues.
Since Goss has had the position of Chief Actuary he has testified before Congress nearly 20 times. He has testified before the House Committee on Ways and Means, subcommittee on Social Security, the Senate Committee on Finance and the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. One actuary who worked on President Franklin Roosevelt’s committee on planning for the new program known as Social Security in 1934, Robert J. Meyers, actually described the job of actuary as “future gazing.”
