The not-so-CLASS Act: Another Time Bomb in Health Care Reform [You're In Unless you Opt Out]

Washington Times ^ | 03/26/10 | Jeff Birnbaum

[freespirited]

Health reform is many things, but not a class act. The reason: the CLASS Act.

The legislation signed into law last week includes a provision called the CLASS Act, which provides long-term care at home. Few know about it, but experts agree it could well explode the federal budget deficit down the road.

The Act was designed to assist people who need help with daily tasks and are willing to pay for in-home assistance. ...

The problem: The plan, as currently constructed, can't possibly pay for itself over the long run and will blow a hole in the federal budget unless lawmakers become more diligent than we expect them to be.

Sen. Kent Conrad, chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, has called the measure a Ponzi scheme. He and other Democrats wrote a letter last year expressing concerns about the fiscal soundness of the proposal.

Ace reporter Jennifer Haberkorn of The Washington Times wrote an excellent front-page article about the dangers of the Act in November. But no one paid much attention.

Haberkorn explained that the program would collect monthly premiums from all working Americans unless they opted out. People who stayed in for five years would be eligible for federal subsidies that would help them purchase in-home care when they could no longer eat, shower or dress themselves.

The arrangement would work for a while. ...

But eventually the worm will turn. By the end of the decade, government and private estimates point out, the CLASS Act will take in billions of dollars less than the monthly premiums can cover and could, in fact, be insolvent by 2021.

[freespirited]

Seriously though could you charge the government for taking care of a sick family member?

I would think the only way you could pull that off would be if you had a real home-health business,the family member was but one of multiple clients, and the family member was not an immediate relative (e.g. a third cousin).

But given how corrupt things are getting, what I think is probably not worth a damn.

[freespirited]

Does SEIU benefit from this scam?

[concentric circles]

Now what would put that thought into your mind?

[GailA]

more bad crap for our Military.

http://ow.ly/1rCSV

[freespirited]

That explains the “opt out” scam. Thanks for digging that out.

[Pontiac]

Democrats reject those accusations. They also insist that the CLASS Act will be kept in the black by diligent lawmakers and bureaucrats in the years to come.

In addition, the Congressional Budget Office and other well-regarded estimators of federal budgets have a tradition of overestimating the cost of new initiatives and underestimating revenue collections. Health reform could well turn out to be a lot more economically prudent than the naysayers claim.

You have got to be kidding me.

Do these Dreamacrats have no shame?

The CBO has a reputation of underestimating cost be a factor of 800% (Medicare) and overestimating income (Social Security).