Many people complete their working lives as bus-drivers
Yesterday I asked whether the American trend towards buying longevity would arrive in the UK. This blog incorporates the thinking of people who consider work and building pensions an antidote to the lethargy of early retirement.
I am glad to see that bus-drivers, who like posties work long and hard, are singled out by commentators for our consideration. I do a lot of time on passengers (having no car) and find myself driven by people my age. Bus drivers are often oldies!
Pension Oldie, who I know works in an industry that measures the efficacity of measures such as semaglutides (drugs purchased in the USA to reduce life threatening obesity), gives us his thinking on why Britain is different.
We think about insuring against depravation in later life through work and pensions, at least most of us do.
I am not sure the effect will be felt in the UK to the same extent as we are not accustomed to having to pay for our drugs, instead the NHS does.
Even in the US where drugs are usually funded by insurers, or Medicare for those with no insurance cover, I understand approximate half the GLP-1 drugs are purchased by individuals themselves (at about $1,000 per month). A recent US study has estimated the affordability to the Medicare system (now even more challenged by Trump/Musk) as follows:
– This study found that 3.6 million individuals (14.2%) were deemed highly likely to qualify for semaglutide treatment for the first time, and broadening the criteria for established CVD could increase this number to 15.2 million individuals (60.9%).
– If all newly eligible beneficiaries were to receive semaglutide treatment, Medicare spending could increase by $34-$145 billion annually.– Even with more conservative definitions of CVD and a significant portion of individuals not maintaining long-term adherence to semaglutide treatment, costs could still increase by $10 billion annually.
– Younger, generally healthier, female Medicare beneficiaries were still likely to remain ineligible for semaglutide treatment according to the coverage provided by Part D Medicare plans.
The drug patents expire in the middle of the next decade, until then there is a flourishing market in counterfeit versions of doubtful efficacy and pressures on pensioners to spend a high proportion of their pension income on these drugs.
In the UK, the NHS has higher qualifying risk criteria for the prescription of similar drugs (in terms of a higher BMI threshold, diagnosed existing comorbidities, as well as a requirement to have tried alternative therapies first) so a smaller proportion of the general population is likely to be affected and those that are already suffer from other health problems, so the cohort effect is likely to be more limited.
Your bus-drivers and shop-fitters and people working in churches and in post rooms should still be encouraged to think about both the amount and the persistence of their pension income, especially if they have a new demand to spend it on drugs!
Memories of working with bus drivers is clearly a trigger to response from Derek Scott who simplifies the argument. Work hard, save hard and stay healthy with the help of your boss.
One bus company close to me (in more ways than one) uses “generous pension” as second in its recruitment drive after “competitive salary”.
stagecoachbus.com/careers/job/job_posting-3-41976
And driver wellbeing programmes are increasingly a feature of support which can be accessed if needed.
drivingforbetterbusiness.com/articles/driver-wellbeing-interventions-advice-ideas-suggestions-resources/
I have a feeling that Brits also are going to stay in work longer to make sure their pensions keep them into later age. This is a separate question but my friend Stancombe is suffering the anxiety of living without work. Is retiring without anything to do too much anxious worry for many of us?
On a more positive note, John Bannister (picked up by Stuart McDonald) , ask us to think of Gladys who rather outlived the actuaries’ expectation through working long, hard and retiring on a lifetime income that lasted her till she was 111.
Dying at 111, Gladys has clearly had a lifetime impact on Trustee John who asks us to consider the future as an aspiration to live as long and happily as Gladys.
