The Never Ending Era of Uncertainty: Managing Risk in a Volatile World

This PowerPoint report, presented by Robert Hartwig, president of the Insurance Information Institute, before the Northeast Business and Economics Association, discusses managing the myriad risks facing the world in a volatile environment. The report categorizes the five major categories of risk as economic, geopolitical, environmental, technological and societal. It notes that uncertainty, risk and fear abound concerning such issues as European sovereign debt and eurozone crises, U.S. debt and the budget crisis, resurgent terrorism, record natural disaster losses and climate change. The report concludes that in spite of the uncertainty and concern, by many objective measures humans are much better off now than at any time in history and that the world will likely avoid falling into another global recession. However, it is still unclear if humans can successfully manage global threats in a cooperative manner.