Manuela Bosch, Doctor in Economic and Business Sciences and Professor at the Faculty of Economics and Business of the University of Barcelona, has been admitted as a full member of the Royal European Academy of Doctors (READ) in the course of a solemn ceremony held on Thursday, 30 April, at Foment del Treball, the Academy’s headquarters. The recipient delivered the admission speech “The Necessary Balance between the State, Companies and Citizens with regard to Retirement Benefits”, in which she examined the successive reforms that have affected the calculation of the contributory retirement pension, focusing on two fundamental areas of the Spanish system, namely the General Social Security Regime and the State Civil Service Pension Regime. She was answered on behalf of the Royal Corporation by a full member and Vice-President of the Board of Governors Maria Àngels Calvo. The session was streamed live on the READ’s YouTube channel, where it may be viewed.
Dra. Manuela Bosch
The expert began her address by stressing that, during their retirement, people should have the financial resources to cover their daily needs and meet the expenses associated with ageing, which constitutes one of the essential objectives of any advanced society. In this regard, she pointed out that achieving this goal rests on a mixed social protection system, structured around a compulsory public pillar and a complementary private pillar, which incorporates both the instruments promoted by companies and the various forms of individual savings aimed at retirement.
After reviewing the history of social protection in the world of work and the tradition and public pension model in Spain, Bosch defended the need for a balanced approach between the public system, a complementary company-based model, and the individual responsibility of citizens. In this regard, she presented the instruments through which companies can contribute to improving employees’ future income levels, the degree of effective implementation and development of these tools within the business fabric, and the factors that condition their adoption.
As for workers’ responsibility for their own retirement, the speaker warned that both the reforms already implemented and those still pending in the Spanish public system have reduced the relative amount of future pensions, causing the replacement rate to decline. Although the system retains its contributory and pay-as-you-go nature, with guaranteed minimum benefits, intergenerational interdependence and ageing make it vulnerable without continuous adjustments. In this respect, she appealed to financial planning, stressing the need to promote greater public awareness of the complementarity between the public system and individual savings decisions, especially in a demographic scenario marked by increased longevity and the foreseeable rise in pressure on public systems.
Bosch was Dean of the Faculty of Business and Communication at the University of Vic–Central University of Catalonia between 2002 and 2006. She teaches on the Master’s Degree in Actuarial and Financial Sciences at the University of Barcelona and on the degrees in Labour Relations, Business Administration and Management, and Public Management and Administration. She is the author of articles and books on public and private pensions and financial education at an early age. She collaborates with the Bosch i Gimpera Foundation in its knowledge transfer programmes for companies and institutions.
Speech: “The Necessary Balance between the State, Companies and Citizens with regard to Retirement Benefits”
