When families are face with senior care and long term care planning and have a moderate income and assets may have to rely on Medicaid to pay part of the cost of senior care. Unfortunately, some states do not allow a healthy spouse who had a previously moderate income a protected resource and income. And the children, relatives and friends are not recognized for the financial sacrifices they make in providing the early care before a recipient becomes bad enough to need Medicaid funded professional help. See Long Term Care Link
Therefore Medicaid planning when using a professional Medicaid planning advisor or qualified elder law attorney, allows you to correct inequities in the system. Medicaid planning in many cases have gained a bad reputation because few individuals, who would normally have too many assets to ever qualify for Medicaid, deliberately use it, many years in advance, to give away everything to their family so as to qualify for Medicaid.
Tax planning and Medicaid planning are no different. A Supreme Court decision condones honest methods of eliminating income taxes or estate taxes. Just like tax planning, Medicaid planning uses existing laws to structure legal strategies.
Tax planning and Medicaid planning both put an additional burden on taxpayers, but one is considered ethical and the other not.
We believe that all strategies have their place in the scheme of things. Medicaid planning fits certain circumstances usually where families are in a crisis mode trying to preserve a few assets such as a house or a savings plan. There is no attempt to take advantage of the taxpayers. Using other strategies for paying the cost of care is much better for a younger generation wanting a plan that will allow for home care, assisted living and a choice in care services.
