Thursday, June 30, 2005
Congress to tighten Medicaid estate planning
[Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar, "Senate Takes On Medicaid Loopholes," The Los Angeles Times, 30 June 2005.]
Medicaid estate planning is increasingly coming under fire as a way to game the system and improperly use taxpayer dollars:
Congress is considering a crackdown on financial planning strategies increasingly favored by middle-class families to shift the cost of nursing home care for elderly parents onto the federal government.
Senate Finance Committee Chairman Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) denounced the practices Wednesday as "legal shenanigans" and vowed to help stop maneuvers he said were turning Medicaid into an asset protection program, instead of what it was supposed to be — an insurer of last resort for elderly people too poor to afford care.
Tightening the rules could save Medicaid $1 billion to $2 billion over five years, Grassley said, though Medicaid's long-term care bill is projected at $290 billion over the next five years.
[See Stephen A. Moses, "Project Proposal: Controlling Medicaid Long-Term Care Costs," The Flint Hills Center, January 2004.]
[Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar, "Senate Takes On Medicaid Loopholes," The Los Angeles Times, 30 June 2005.]
Medicaid estate planning is increasingly coming under fire as a way to game the system and improperly use taxpayer dollars:
Congress is considering a crackdown on financial planning strategies increasingly favored by middle-class families to shift the cost of nursing home care for elderly parents onto the federal government.
Senate Finance Committee Chairman Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) denounced the practices Wednesday as "legal shenanigans" and vowed to help stop maneuvers he said were turning Medicaid into an asset protection program, instead of what it was supposed to be — an insurer of last resort for elderly people too poor to afford care.
Tightening the rules could save Medicaid $1 billion to $2 billion over five years, Grassley said, though Medicaid's long-term care bill is projected at $290 billion over the next five years.
[See Stephen A. Moses, "Project Proposal: Controlling Medicaid Long-Term Care Costs," The Flint Hills Center, January 2004.]
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