Both candidates for President have made it clear that they intend to continue traditional medical benefits for current retirees and those nearing retirement and they both claim that the other candidate would make some changes that undermine Medicare. It is true that Medicare is an important program for retirees and it is important for anyone nearing retirement to understand this program. All voters should consider the impact any changes in Medicare will have on them as they make their decision about which candidate to support in November. But, anyone who is retired or planning to retire one day should also pay attention to the debate about Medicaid. What’s going on with Medicaid? Medicaid is usually thought of as the health insurance program that covers care for poor families. While ...

Home health care helps many senior citizens age in place. This is a valuable service that provides assistance to seniors while they maintain their homes. The services can be expensive and not all care is covered by insurance. To meet the expense, many senior citizens have turned to reverse mortgages which offer a financial solution and make retirement easier for some. However, recent news reports raise the troubling prospect that home health care may not be available at any price for some seniors because there just might not be enough people providing this service. Demand for home health care workers is increasing as the number of baby boomers, usually defined as the 78 million Americans born between 1946 and 1964, reach retirement. Home health care crisis: not just cost, but shortage of l...

MarketWatch recently offered a surprisingly upbeat assessment of retirement planning. The news service reported that, “One third of people close to retirement said they don’t know how much money they will need to cover basic expenses in retirement, according to a new study.” Allianz Life Insurance Company of North America also surveyed some 1,000 U.S. residents who were between the age of 55 and 65. Questions covered were what concerns retirement planning raises and how much money respondents think they need to retire. It seems optimistic to us that two-thirds of those facing retirement within the decade know how much money they will need. There are just too many uncertainties in life and in the current market environment, but figuring out how much needs to be saved for retirement: ...

Long-term care insurance is an excellent example of how confusing personal finance can be. Forbes recently had an article on whether or not you should buy a policy and the answer was “it depends,” which we probably should have guessed just from the article title, “The Maybe Policy.” In general, it seems like most people would not need this type of insurance coverage, according to the experts that Forbes relied on. The basics of long-term care insurance, and how to decide if you need it In part, the answer to this question is determined by your assets and income. If you have limited income and assets of less than $200,000, the answer is clear: don’t buy private insurance. Medicaid provides a safety net and it should cover people at this level of wealth. If your assets top $2 milli...

With the Supreme Court clearing the way for the Affordable Care Act to be implemented, retirees may be wondering, “What’s next?” Retirees are not alone in asking this question. Almost every American citizen will be impacted by the law, yet no one seems to be able to fully explain how the law will fundamentally change health care, save for the arguments against and for the law presenting last Spring to the High Court. The political debate is probably drowning out much of the news that would focus on the impact of the law. Some of the laws of the ACA as it relates to retirees One of the most widely explained benefits of the law is that young people, defined as children and adults under the age of 26, will be able to stay on their parent’s insurance policies under the law. This, o...

A newly retired couple will need an estimated $240,000 to meet their health care expenses over the course of their lives. Fidelity Investments releases their estimate every year and the mutual fund giant reports that health care costs are increasing again, after dipping slightly last year. This year’s total is up about 4 percent from a year ago. Annual increases have averaged about 6 percent since Fidelity published its first estimate in 2002. How the Fidelity report was conducted The study is based on projections for a 65-year-old couple retiring this year with Medicare coverage. The estimate includes Medicare’s premiums, co-payments and deductibles, and out-of-pocket prescription costs. The study assumes the couple does not have any other insurance, and then incorporates a life expec...