LTC
Bullet: LTC Debate Preview and
Guide
Tuesday, September 6, 2005
Washington, DC--
LTC Comment: Tomorrow's
webcast debate, "Medicaid and the Long-Term Care Crisis:
Who Should Pay?," will be much more interesting if you know who the
discussants are and what to expect them to say.
More after the ***news.***
***
GREAT DEBATE on Medicaid and long-term care.
Limited seating is filling fast for Steve Moses's debate with Vincent
Russo, a major New York Medicaid planner and former president of the National
Academy of Elder Law Attorneys. The
debate will take place at the Cato Institute (1000 Mass. Ave., NW in Wash., DC)
on Wednesday, September 7 at noon. Free
lunch is included. Details and a
registration form (required) are available online at http://www.cato.org/event.php?eventid=2307.
Marilyn Werber Serafini of the National Journal will moderate the
debate and Cato's Michael Cannon, whose book on health policy will be released
September 19, will offer comments. ***
***
IF YOU CAN'T BE THERE IN PERSON, be sure to catch the webcast live at https://www.cato.org/event.php?eventid=2307
or in the Cato media archives at http://www.cato.org/realaudio/audiopages.html.
***
***
CAPITOL HILL BRIEFING on Medicaid and long-term care financing.
On Friday, September 9 at noon (free lunch to follow), Steve Moses will
give a briefing titled "The Trouble with Medicaid" in Room B-354 of
the Rayburn House Office Building. Details,
an online registration form and special instructions for news media may be found
at http://www.cato.org/event.php?eventid=2388.
Cato's Jagadeesh Gokhale, Senior Fellow and Michael Cannon, Director of
Health Policy Studies will also speak at this event, which is open to the
public. ***
LTC BULLET: LTC
DEBATE PREVIEW AND GUIDE
LTC Comment: According
to the old saying, "You can't follow the game without a program."
So, following is some information about tomorrow's debate and the
participants, including a preview of what to expect.
TITLE OF THE DEBATE: "Medicaid
and the Long-Term Care Crisis: Who Should Pay?"
TIME: Wednesday,
September 7, 2005 at Noon.
LOCATION: The
Cato Institute at 1000 Massachusetts Avenue, N.W. in Washington, DC.
Pre-registration at http://www.cato.org/event.php?eventid=2307
is required.
WEBCAST: Catch
the debate live at https://www.cato.org/event.php?eventid=2307
or watch it later in the Cato Institute's video archives at http://www.cato.org/realaudio/audiopages.html.
DESCRIPTION OF THE DEBATE:
"Medicaid,
the joint federal-state health care program created in 1965 for the poor, is
imposing a growing burden on taxpayers. It
has grown larger than Medicare, the federal health care program for the elderly,
and already accounts for a larger share of state expenditures than elementary
and secondary education. Part of
that growth is due to many middle-income seniors using Medicaid to pay for
nursing home expenses and other long-term care.
Those seniors own assets that could cover such expenses for a period of
time, either directly or by purchasing long-term care insurance.
Should their assets be used to help Congress cut projected Medicaid
expenditures? Please join us for a
debate that could profoundly affect the future of Medicaid and long-term
care."
PARTICIPANTS:
INTRODUCTION: Michael F. Cannon, Director of Health Policy Studies, Cato
Institute, author of the recent Cato policy analysis "Medicaid's Unforeseen
Costs" and of a new book on health policy forthcoming September 19, 2005.
MODERATOR: Marilyn
Werber Serafini, the distinguished health
care correspondent for the highly regarded National Journal, an
indispensable publication for public policy makers, lobbyists, and analysts.
DEBATERS:
The two discussants for this debate:
Stephen
Moses is president of the Center for Long-Term Care Reform, an outspoken critic
of Medicaid estate planning and a strong advocate of private long-term care
financing alternatives. For
details, see www.centerltc.com.
Vincent
Russo is managing shareholder of Vincent Russo & Associates, P.C., an elder
law firm with five offices on Long Island, New York. Russo is a Medicaid planner and a former president of the
National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys. For
details, see www.russoelderlaw.com.
STRUCTURE:
Michael Cannon will introduce the subject.
Marilyn Werber Serafini will introduce the discussants.
Then, Moses and Russo will present their answers to the question
"Who Should Pay for Long-Term Care?"
Each will have exactly ten minutes to make the best case for his
position.
Following
the presentations, the discussants will ask two questions of each other in turn.
Russo will have one minute to ask the first question.
Moses will have two minutes to reply.
And Russo will have one minute for an optional rebuttal.
Then Moses will ask the second question, followed by Russo's reply, and
Moses's rebuttal. And so on.
After
two rounds of questions and answers between the discussants, the remaining time
will be given over to questions from the audience.
WHAT
TO EXPECT: Steve Moses will
critique America's publicly financed long-term care service delivery and
financing system, recommend modifications to Medicaid (some of which have
already been recommended by the National Governors Association and the Medicaid
Commission), and propose a heavier reliance in the future on private long-term
care financing alternatives such as insurance and home equity conversion.
We
anticipate that Mr. Russo will emphasize the personal financial and emotional
burden of long-term care on families, advocate for more public financing of
long-term care through Medicaid and Medicare, defend Medicaid estate planning,
critique private financing alternatives like long-term care insurance and
reverse mortgages, and oppose most measures to contain public expenditures for
long-term care.
HEADS
UP: Below are some of the ways
Medicaid planners commonly defend artificial impoverishment of their clients
followed by our rebuttals of each of these excuses.
When you watch and listen to the debate, see if any of these arguments
are used.
EXCUSES FOR MEDICAID PLANNING AND COUNTER ARGUMENTS
EXCUSE: Our
clients are not rich.
FACT: Average Medicaid planning
client is among the upper 10 or 20 percent of seniors in income and assets:
$25,000 to $30,000 in income; home owned free and clear worth $250,000 to
$400,000 plus $150,000 to $200,000 in additional assets.
EXCUSE: Don't
get the wrong illness: heart attack
victims get Medicare; Alzheimer's victims get impoverished.
FACT: We'll lose Medicare long
before we'll get social insurance for LTC.
EXCUSE: If
Congress didn't want the wealthy on welfare, they wouldn't put loopholes in the
law.
FACT: Ten Congresses and four
Presidents have struggled to stop Medicaid planning, even going so far as to
criminalize the practice, albeit unsuccessfully.
For example: TEFRA '82, OBRA '85, MCCA '88, OBRA '93, HIPAA '96, BBA '97.
EXCUSE: There
is no difference between Medicaid care and private pay care.
FACT: Medicaid pays for very little
HCBS or assisted living.
FACT: Medicaid is already on its
last legs fiscally and threatens to drive nursing homes into bankruptcy
throughout the U.S. What will it be
in five or ten years?
FACT: Medicaid eligibility rules
can change as happened in OBRA '85; you may lose your eligibility after you've
lost your money.
FACT: The best nursing homes are
not Medicaid-certified, but are 100% private pay.
Go to three nursing homes: all
private pay, all Medicaid, and in between.
Then decide.
FACT: Medicaid pays for "low
cost care of uncertain quality" and Medicaid planners' clients crowd out
the poor from the best Medicaid beds.
FACT: When economic times are
tough, like now, Medicaid planning clients can lose their beds in good nursing
homes when "bed reserve days" are cut.
EXCUSE: You
paid your taxes; you have a right to free nursing home care.
FACT: Medicaid is welfare, not
social insurance like Medicare and Social Security.
You are entitled to nothing unless you legitimately meet income and asset
limits.
EXCUSE: Medicaid
planning is only one small part of what elder law attorneys do.
FACT: Medicaid planning is the
"cash cow" of most elder law practices generating the vast majority of
all revenue.
EXCUSE: Medicaid
planning is as ethical as tax planning.
FACT: Tax planning does not cause a
vulnerable elder who could have afforded quality private home care or assisted
living to lose his or her life savings and become dependent on a bankrupt
welfare program for underfinanced nursing home care.
EXCUSE: Our
clients are the seniors, not the "greedy heirs."
FACT: The driving force behind
Medicaid planning is the adult heirs who make both financial and health care
decisions for their cognitively impaired parents and therefore have a conflict
of interest.
EXCUSE: Medicaid
planning is crucial because most people are either too young or too old, too
rich or too poor for LTC insurance.
FACT: Nonsense.
Most Americans can afford private LTCI at some point in their lives and
would buy it except for perverse incentives in public policy that reward
Medicaid planning and punish responsibility.
EXCUSE: We
recommend LTC insurance for anyone who qualifies financially and medically.
FACT: Medicaid planners give
lip-service to LTC insurance, but are rarely sources of qualified referrals.
Every insured senior is one less Medicaid planning client.
EXCUSE: It's
just not right for hard-working, tax-paying responsible people to get nothing
while the irresponsible get Medicaid.
FACT: Welcome to welfare.
That's what it is. It
rewards irresponsibility and punishes responsibility.
Same with social insurance. Only
private insurance prices risk and charges irresponsible poor risks more than it
charges responsible people who are good risks.
EXCUSE: Medicaid
planning and LTCI go together: buy
a three-year policy and then transfer assets.
FACT: This is terrible advice that
results in coordinating benefits between private insurance that buys quality
care at the most appropriate level and a bankrupt welfare program that pays
inadequately only for nursing home care.