Washington becomes first state to pass long-term care
up to $36,500 to pay for elderly care expenses!
Some good news out of Washington this week: lawmakers passed the first-ever publicly-funded long-term care benefit — up to $36,500 (indexed to inflation) to spend on a wide-range of elderly care expenses, from paying caregivers, to constructing wheelchair ramps, to meal deliveries, to nursing home fees. The bill would be financed by a modest monthly payroll tax —58 cents for every $100 earned in income — that individuals would pay in for at least three years, and up to ten.
Long-term care is not covered under Medicare, but many people don’t realize this until it’s too late. One of the craziest things about our system is that because long-term care is covered under Medicaid, millions of Americans end up depleting their assets to below $2,000 in order to qualify. We literally incentivize seniors going into poverty so they can access the services. By providing a long-term care benefit, Washington seniors will be able to more easily avoid this situation, and taxpayers expect to save $3.9 billion in state Medicaid costs over the next thirty years.
It’s an exciting bill, and fits into a larger vision advocates have for some kind of universal family care — a comprehensive social infrastructure that one day could support childcare, paid sick leave, parental leave, and elderly care.
I wrote it makes sense in some ways this pioneering legislation would start in Washington. In 2013, the small town of SeaTac, which surrounds the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, voted to increase its minimum wage to $15 an hour — the first real policy win for the nascent Fight for $15 movement. Seattle would be the first major city to approve $15 minimum wage a year later, and in 2016, voters backed a statewide minimum wage increase and paid sick leave.
Caregivers are also excited about the bill — they see it as not just a way to provide financial relief for families, but a way to elevate the caregiving field writ large, and help people see caregivers as the integral part of health care teams that they are.
Can read the Intercept story here.
If you need any more incentive, here’s Ai-jen Poo!