This is the first cartoon from the Assumption Theatre theme — about the dark art of actuarial assumption-setting.

Every actuary has sat in a room where someone wrote a number on a whiteboard, circled it with great authority, and called it a long-term assumption. The fact that the world outside the window looked nothing like the number was, apparently, beside the point.

The profession's ability to define away inconvenient facts with a straight face is genuinely impressive. It is also, occasionally, worth laughing at.

The Politics Actuary is a weekly cartoon series about actuaries, AI, the profession, and the absurdities of overregulation. It follows a dad who can't switch off his professional brain, a family who've learned to live with it, and an inexplicable pet crocodile.

Any resemblance to real actuaries is entirely intentional.

Previous cartoons: #1 Record Investment | #2 Y-Axis Trick | #3 Prompt Engineering | #4 Transparency Request | #5 Define Everyone