Letter: Surprised at Tisei's opposition to CLASS Act

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February 22, 2012

The Salem News Wed Feb 22, 2012, 04:30 AM EST

To the editor:

I read with surprise Republican congressional candidate Richard Tisei's column and claim that the passage of the CLASS Act "is living proof of the problems that plague our capital." ("Tierney, Dems won't let discredited CLASS Act die," Opinion, Tuesday, Feb. 14.)

As someone who has worked with Richard, I was surprised by his position. Those of us who advocated for CLASS were happy to see it passed with the Affordable Care Act.

The reason: For people who need daily assistance with the activities of life, Medicaid is the only insurance available. This includes people with disabilities and seniors. Private insurers of long-term care provided very time-limited contracts.

In fact, according to Judy Feder, former dean of the Georgetown Public Policy Institute, 40 percent of those who need assistance with life activities are under the age of 65. The Kaiser Family Foundation has reported "over 10 million Americans need long-term services and supports to assist them in life's daily activities, and that number is expected to grow." And Sen. Jay Rockefeller stated in Politico that the number will be 20 million by 2020.

Our policymakers should be doing SOMETHING about long-term care.

The Arc supported the CLASS Act for several years before President Obama's election. The twofold goal was to take the pressure off Medicaid and not force people to become poor in order to get long-term care assistance.

Today, members of Congress talk about deep cuts to Medicaid. But the pressure on Medicaid spending can only grow given the rise in the numbers of seniors due to the baby-boom generation and the continued needs of persons with disabilities.

So CLASS makes sense. It develops a self-funded mechanism for care. This will divert a percentage of those who will need help with life's daily activities from the Medicaid rolls in the future.

The final CLASS Act was a compromise between Republicans and Democrats. Those who were resistant to CLASS refused to let it work like Medicare. This would have meant CLASS payments would have been through an automatic payroll deduction, which would have resulted in better financing of the program. The compromise has made the program's financial base a weaker one.

In either case, CLASS is a winner. I'm glad Congressman John Tierney and the Massachusetts delegation voted for the CLASS Act, and so are millions of others.

Partial subsidy of CLASS is cheaper than full payment through Medicaid, but we would prefer the automatic payroll deduction, which would make it stronger in an actuarial sense. But the real dialogue shouldn't be focused just on CLASS. Shouldn't it be about the growing need for community-based, long-term care services in the future?

We should be talking about how we'll meet a real challenge facing all Americans — our parents, brothers, sisters or children in the not-too-distant future.

If not CLASS, what?

Leo V. Sarkissian

Executive Director

The Arc of Massachusetts

Waltham

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