1. Access to Quality Care--Some people realize that the quality of care available under welfare can be less than private pay. Also, quality nursing homes tend to favor private pay patients during admissions. Being able to choose a nursing home gives a family the freedom to move their loved one into a quality facility, nearby, when the time comes.
2. Burden--Most people don't want to be a burden on their spouse, kids, relatives, friends, etc. This burden is both financial and emotional, resulting in guilt.
3. Asset Protection--Everything an individual worked for can be wiped out by nursing home costs. A lot of people would rather have their home, life savings, and other assets go to their family or charity, instead of a nursing home.
4. Control or Independence--We are used to making choices in our lives. We choose where we want to live, what kind of car we drive, who our doctor is, etc. Most people wish to maintain control, rather than relinquishing it to welfare.
5. Aversion to Welfare--People don't want to be dependent on the government for care. They feel welfare is for the truly needy, not for people trying to hide their assets in order to qualify.
6. Peace of Mind--The peace of mind offered by quality long-term care coverage is immeasurable. Being able to go to bed at night knowing one is protected, instead of worrying about what to do if something happens, is a feeling most people desire.
What's your reason for not having it?????
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
Saturday, December 12, 2009
Baby Boomers and the Long Term Care Partnership: Part III
What did we learn from the 60s? Probably the most important thing that we were able to grab onto and keep is the fact that we can't rely on the government to provide us with everything we want. As Mick Jagger pointed out, "You can't always get what you want, but if you try sometime, you get what you need."
We learned that we have to take care of ourselves, but at the same time we have to have compassion for our fellow men/women.
So, we grew up helping take care of our brothers and sisters, then we started taking care of our own children. As they grew up, we expected them to help take care of their siblings, as we became two income families.
The women's liberation movement meant that moms were no longer expected to stay home, and our want for more luxuries (which eventually became necessities) meant that one income just wasn't enough any more.
And finally, as our children grew into adulthood, we thought we were done being caregivers and we could just begin to live out our empty nest years in peaceful bliss.
But as John Lennon put it, "Life is what happens to you while you are busy making other plans."
Two things happened. First, our parents, who worked so hard to provide the best possible lives for us, and leave us with a legacy of great wealth, started living longer. And our children started having kids of their own.
As fate would have it, our children learned from us that in order to have all of the "necessities" of life, both spouses would need to work.
Thus we became the "Sandwich Generation".
We were given the responsibility of helping to raise our children's children and being the primary caretaker of our parents.
And now, as we enter the autumn of our lives we find that while we are much more affluent than any generation before us, the burdens and lifestyles that we embraced have also left us less healthy than the generation that preceded us. Not only that, there are a whopping 78 million of us!
With the baby boom generation aging and the cost of services going up, paying for long-term care is an issue of pressing importance for policy-makers and individuals alike. While some individuals can count on friends and family to assist with the activities of daily living, many others must determine how to pay for extended home-health services or a potential stay in a nursing facility.
In 2003, the most recent year for which data are available, national spending on long term care totaled $183 billion, and nearly half of that was paid for by the Medicaid program, the joint federal-state health care financing program that covers basic health and long-term care services for certain low-income individuals. Private
insurance paid a small portion of long-term care expenditures—about $16 billion or
9 percent in 2003. With the aging of the baby boom generation, long-term care
expenditures are anticipated to increase sharply in coming decades. The projected
spending on long-term care presents a looming fiscal challenge for federal and state
governments. As a result, some policymakers are looking for ways to reduce the
proportion of long-term care spending financed by Medicaid and promote private
insurance as a larger funding source.
The Long-Term Care Partnership Program is a public-private partnership between
states and private insurance companies, designed to reduce Medicaid expenditures
by delaying or eliminating the need for some people to rely on Medicaid to pay for
long-term care services. Individuals, who buy select private long-term care insurance
policies that are designated by a state as partnership policies and eventually need
long-term care services, first rely on benefits from their private long-term care
insurance policy to cover long-term care costs before they access Medicaid. To
qualify for Medicaid, applicants must meet certain eligibility requirements, including income and asset requirements. Traditionally, applicants cannot have assets that exceed certain thresholds and must “spend down” or deplete as much of their assets as is required to meet financial eligibility thresholds. To encourage the purchase of private partnership policies, long-term care insurance policyholders are allowed to protect some or all of their assets from Medicaid spend-down requirements during the eligibility determination process, but they still must meet income requirements.
In Colorado, for instance, an individual is allowed to keep a house, car, and a total of $2000 in other assets (i.e. savings, investments, etc.). A married couple can keep another $100,000 for the spouse. That would mean that if a couple was worth $500,000 (not counting their dwelling and vehicle), and one of them needed care in a nursing home, they would be required to spend $398,000 before becoming eligible for Medicaid. However, if they had purchased a Long Term Care Insurance Policy that was eligible for the Partnership program, and that policy had paid out $400,000 in benefits and then was exhausted, the spouse at home would be able to keep the entire $500,000.
Long term care insurance coverage is not cheap. In Colorado, a married couple of about 55 years of age could expect to pay around $300 to $500 per month for a good policy with one of the top rated carriers. However, if that couple decides to wait until they are 65, when you factor in inflation, the cost of the policy is between $900 and $1200 per month.
And that doesn't take into account the fact that they are less likely to be able to get coverage at that age because of health conditions.
What kind of legacy do you want to leave? How do you want to be remembered? Just as we need to leave this world a better place than we found it, we need to leave our future generations in better shape than when we arrived.
America’s national debt is a record-breaking $12 trillion, and expected to nearly double in the next ten years. Unsustainable borrowing has created the largest debt in history.
It is not our fault that there are 78 million of us. We are not to blame for the fact that we are living much longer (though less healthier) lives.
However, we can do something to help not only ourselves, but our spouses, and our Children's Children We can take responsibility now, so that we are not a burden to our families, and hopefully not contributing more to an already unfathomable national debt.
We can purchase a Long Term Care Insurance Partnership Policy, and be a part of the solution, rather than the problem. Just like in the 60s, fellow boomers, if you are not a part of the soluciton, you are part of the problem.
If you would like more information about Long Term Care Insurance, please feel free to contact me at george.yardley@physiciansmutual.com.
Thanks for reading my blogs.
We learned that we have to take care of ourselves, but at the same time we have to have compassion for our fellow men/women.
So, we grew up helping take care of our brothers and sisters, then we started taking care of our own children. As they grew up, we expected them to help take care of their siblings, as we became two income families.
The women's liberation movement meant that moms were no longer expected to stay home, and our want for more luxuries (which eventually became necessities) meant that one income just wasn't enough any more.
And finally, as our children grew into adulthood, we thought we were done being caregivers and we could just begin to live out our empty nest years in peaceful bliss.
But as John Lennon put it, "Life is what happens to you while you are busy making other plans."
Two things happened. First, our parents, who worked so hard to provide the best possible lives for us, and leave us with a legacy of great wealth, started living longer. And our children started having kids of their own.
As fate would have it, our children learned from us that in order to have all of the "necessities" of life, both spouses would need to work.
Thus we became the "Sandwich Generation".
We were given the responsibility of helping to raise our children's children and being the primary caretaker of our parents.
And now, as we enter the autumn of our lives we find that while we are much more affluent than any generation before us, the burdens and lifestyles that we embraced have also left us less healthy than the generation that preceded us. Not only that, there are a whopping 78 million of us!
With the baby boom generation aging and the cost of services going up, paying for long-term care is an issue of pressing importance for policy-makers and individuals alike. While some individuals can count on friends and family to assist with the activities of daily living, many others must determine how to pay for extended home-health services or a potential stay in a nursing facility.
In 2003, the most recent year for which data are available, national spending on long term care totaled $183 billion, and nearly half of that was paid for by the Medicaid program, the joint federal-state health care financing program that covers basic health and long-term care services for certain low-income individuals. Private
insurance paid a small portion of long-term care expenditures—about $16 billion or
9 percent in 2003. With the aging of the baby boom generation, long-term care
expenditures are anticipated to increase sharply in coming decades. The projected
spending on long-term care presents a looming fiscal challenge for federal and state
governments. As a result, some policymakers are looking for ways to reduce the
proportion of long-term care spending financed by Medicaid and promote private
insurance as a larger funding source.
The Long-Term Care Partnership Program is a public-private partnership between
states and private insurance companies, designed to reduce Medicaid expenditures
by delaying or eliminating the need for some people to rely on Medicaid to pay for
long-term care services. Individuals, who buy select private long-term care insurance
policies that are designated by a state as partnership policies and eventually need
long-term care services, first rely on benefits from their private long-term care
insurance policy to cover long-term care costs before they access Medicaid. To
qualify for Medicaid, applicants must meet certain eligibility requirements, including income and asset requirements. Traditionally, applicants cannot have assets that exceed certain thresholds and must “spend down” or deplete as much of their assets as is required to meet financial eligibility thresholds. To encourage the purchase of private partnership policies, long-term care insurance policyholders are allowed to protect some or all of their assets from Medicaid spend-down requirements during the eligibility determination process, but they still must meet income requirements.
In Colorado, for instance, an individual is allowed to keep a house, car, and a total of $2000 in other assets (i.e. savings, investments, etc.). A married couple can keep another $100,000 for the spouse. That would mean that if a couple was worth $500,000 (not counting their dwelling and vehicle), and one of them needed care in a nursing home, they would be required to spend $398,000 before becoming eligible for Medicaid. However, if they had purchased a Long Term Care Insurance Policy that was eligible for the Partnership program, and that policy had paid out $400,000 in benefits and then was exhausted, the spouse at home would be able to keep the entire $500,000.
Long term care insurance coverage is not cheap. In Colorado, a married couple of about 55 years of age could expect to pay around $300 to $500 per month for a good policy with one of the top rated carriers. However, if that couple decides to wait until they are 65, when you factor in inflation, the cost of the policy is between $900 and $1200 per month.
And that doesn't take into account the fact that they are less likely to be able to get coverage at that age because of health conditions.
What kind of legacy do you want to leave? How do you want to be remembered? Just as we need to leave this world a better place than we found it, we need to leave our future generations in better shape than when we arrived.
America’s national debt is a record-breaking $12 trillion, and expected to nearly double in the next ten years. Unsustainable borrowing has created the largest debt in history.
It is not our fault that there are 78 million of us. We are not to blame for the fact that we are living much longer (though less healthier) lives.
However, we can do something to help not only ourselves, but our spouses, and our Children's Children We can take responsibility now, so that we are not a burden to our families, and hopefully not contributing more to an already unfathomable national debt.
We can purchase a Long Term Care Insurance Partnership Policy, and be a part of the solution, rather than the problem. Just like in the 60s, fellow boomers, if you are not a part of the soluciton, you are part of the problem.
If you would like more information about Long Term Care Insurance, please feel free to contact me at george.yardley@physiciansmutual.com.
Thanks for reading my blogs.
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