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October 15, 2012 at 04:29 PM
An analyst at the AARP Public Policy Institute is recommending that states consider trying to add laws and regulations to make long-term care (LTC) services and long-term care insurance (LTCI) more affordable.
The analyst, Ari Houser, makes those recommendations in a paper on the “private-pay affordability” of LTC services.
The more middle-income and high-income people in an area can pay for LTC services with their own resources, the more likely low-income will be able to be to supplement the services they get through public programs, Houser said.
House has included an 11-page table showing how the median cost of nursing home care and the median cost of home health care compare with the median annual household income of market residents ages 65 and older.
In most of Alaska, for example, the median cost of a year in a nursing home is $285,613, or more than 6 times the median household income of a senior living in the state, and the cost of a year of home health care 89 percent of the median income.
In New Haven, Conn., the median cost of a year in a nursing home is almost $152,000, or about 440 percent of the median senior’s household income.
Houser also talks briefly about private LTCI coverage and the cost of LTCI coverage.
