"Successful Aging," Ronni Bennett, Time Goes By, February 17, 2020
Written by and for older folks.  Read the comments.  What do folks you work with think about the topic?
"The phrase in that headline always sets my teeth on edge. As popular as it is in newspaper, magazine and online headers, and particularly as a book title (I stopped counting at Amazon when I got to 24), it always makes me wonder this: Successful as opposed to what? Unsuccessful aging? Failed aging?

A percentage of old and retired people live in poverty. Is that failed aging? A lot of old people refuse to acknowledge they are getting old. Does that fall on the success or the failure side of aging? And who sets the criteria?

I'm not even sure it's possible for anyone to fail at aging."
Go here -> https://www.timegoesby.net/weblog/2020/02/successful-aging.html


"Trump administration cuts to Social Security disability benefits among the cruelest-America already has among the strictest eligibility standards in the world," Rebecca Vallas, USA Today,  January 27, 2020
"Hardly a day goes by without the Trump administration finding a new way to slash the safety net.

But its latest proposal — which would cut Social Security disability benefits by $2.6 billion over 10 years — is one of the cruelest. It would require millions of beneficiaries to re-prove their disability — and navigate a complex web of red tape and paperwork — every two years. Hundreds of thousands of people could lose benefits even though their condition has not changed."
Go here -> https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/todaysdebate/2020/01/27/trump-administration-cuts-disability-benefits-among-cruelest-editorials-debates/4592737002/


"Trump’s budget proposal probably won’t reduce your Social Security check, experts say, but will it lower your quality of life and health care?" Alessandra Malito, MarketWatch, February 12, 2020 
"President Trump’s 2021 budget proposal takes swipes at entitlement programs like Medicare and Social Security — and targeting those and other programs could adversely affect older Americans and their quality of life, experts say.

The budget, if it were to pass as is (which is seen as very unlikely), would trim about $505 billion from Medicare over a decade, and $35 billion from Social Security Disability Insurance and Supplemental Security Income, according to the bipartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. The proposal calls for tightening eligibility requirements for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, also known as food stamps, and toughening Medicaid eligibility requirements, such as enforcing asset limits.

The good news for Medicare and Social Security retirement beneficiaries: These cuts don’t directly affect participants’ benefits. The bad news: provisions within the proposal could undermine retirement security all the same."
Go here -> https://www.marketwatch.com/story/trumps-budget-proposal-wont-reduce-your-social-security-check-but-it-could-lower-your-quality-of-life-and-health-care-2020-02-11


"Medicare in the 2021 Trump Budget," Paul N. Van de Water, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, February 13, 2020
"President Trump’s 2021 budget proposes about $500 billion in net Medicare spending reductions over ten years (see table), most of which would come from reducing payments to health care providers and not affect beneficiaries directly.

For the most part, the budget does not reflect the President’s efforts to end the Affordable Care Act (ACA) or his executive order calling for various Medicare changes. These policies, which a budget would typically include, would weaken Medicare in several ways."
Go here ->https://www.cbpp.org/blog/medicare-in-the-2021-trump-budget


 "Medicare payment change is making it harder for some patients to get home health care," Judith Graham, Washington Post, February 15, 2020
"The decision came out of the blue. “Your husband isn’t going to get any better, so we can’t continue services,” an occupational therapist told Deloise “Del” Holloway in early November. “Medicare isn’t going to pay for it.”

The therapist handed Del a notice explaining why the home health agency she represented was terminating care within 48 hours. “All teaching complete,” it concluded. “No further hands on skilled care. Wife states she knows how to perform exercises.”

That came as a shock. In May 2017, at age 57, Anthony Holloway was diagnosed with ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis): Anthony, of Frederick, Md., can’t walk, get out of bed or breathe on his own (he’s on a ventilator). He can’t use the toilet, bathe or dress himself. Therapists had been helping Anthony maintain his strength, to the extent possible, for two years."
Go here -> https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/medicare-payment-change-is-making-it-harder-for-some-patients-to-get-home-health-care/2020/02/14/a8aaf43c-46ad-11ea-bc78-8a18f7afcee7_story.html


‘It’s Pretty Brutal’: The Sandwich Generation Pays a Price-Parents feel emotionally and financially stressed by caring for young children and older relatives at the same time," Jessica Grose, New York Times, February 11, 2020
"When Tanya Brice’s mother moved into her apartment in Owings Mills, Md., five years ago, she was already caring for twin toddlers, one of whom has autism and an intellectual disability, and a teenage son. Brice, 43, is a single mom and was supporting the household on a social worker’s salary. Her budget and schedule were stressed to the breaking point.

Her mother, Janice, was medically fragile — she had hepatitis C and diabetes — and Medicaid wouldn’t pay for a home health aid, so that came out of Brice’s pocket, along with the money for higher electricity bills from her mother’s ventilator, and the extra food and necessities her mother needed."
Go here-> https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/11/parenting/sandwich-generation-costs.html
And here -> https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/11/parenting/sandwich-generation-stress.html


"Caregiving, or career? The choice no woman should have to make-Up to 80 percent of older adults are cared for at home by a family member, the majority of them women. That's led many caregivers to feel like they have to put their career on the backburner," By Halley Bondy, NBC News, January 29, 2020
"Evan McGonagill, 31, had a very different vision of her life. She imagined that she’d be living in Philadelphia, where she was building a career in university library archives. She planned to climb the ladder in her field and then perhaps go to graduate school.

But a visit to her mother’s house in Boston changed all of that.

“[My mother] had always been the record keeper in the family. She had done everything with our finances,” said McGonagill. “But when I visited…I was knee-deep in papers in two rooms. It was just a sea of scrambled records.” McGonagill didn’t know that her mother, who is in her 70s, had been suffering from major neurocognitive disorder, a precursor to Alzheimer’s. Her mother had been forgetting to pay bills. Debt collectors and scammers were calling."
Go here -> https://www.nbcnews.com/know-your-value/feature/caregiving-or-career-choice-no-woman-should-have-make-ncna1125616


"The health care swamp has not been drained," Axios, January 28, 2020
"The health care industry has dramatically increased its federal lobbying under President Trump, and it has paid off for those companies.

Why it matters: The influence economy has only gotten bigger over the past three years, despite Trump's calls to "drain the swamp." Lobbying expenses have soared, and in the process, the health care industry has largely gotten what it wanted in Washington.

Axios analyzed the federal lobbying reports of 60 health care companies and trade organizations from 2014 through 2019 — the last three years of the Obama administration, and the first three years of Trump's."
Go here -> https://www.axios.com/health-care-lobbying-trump-drain-swamp-f2ec6b40-308b-4e10-9fac-a2efae587968.html
And here -> https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1UXEbZeKPBdPL1VUOUd73O-i1qzaWni8TZProjCeplP4/edit#gid=0


"Private insurance is health care's pot of gold," Axios, January 17, 2020
Repost.
"Private health insurance is a conduit for exploding health care spending, and there's no end in sight.

The big picture: Most politicians defend this status quo, even though prices are soaring. And as the industry's top executives and lobbyists gathered this week in San Francisco, some nodded to concerns over affordability — but then went on to tell investors how they plan to keep the money flowing.

Where it stands: More than 160 million Americans get private insurance through an employer or on their own, and per-person spending in that market rose by almost 7% in 2018, the highest annual growth rate in 14 years."
Go here -> https://www.axios.com/jp-morgan-2020-private-health-insurance-prices-costs-1e92f969-bffc-4584-a3c9-e8c4072b5144.html
And here-> https://www.axios.com/hospital-finances-cost-shifting-theory-90d25875-e90b-475f-b815-4635fb708c87.html
/T

"Older Workers Know They Face An Unfriendly Labor Market," SCEPA/The New School, February 10, 2020
"Data confirm older workers’ wary assessment of their job prospects. The wage premium for experienced workers is declining. Between 1992 and 2015, the effect of an additional year of experience on the hourly wages of older workers fell by 45%. When older workers get rehired, their hourly wages are lower than their previous job. Following a job loss, median hourly wages of older workers ages 50-61 are 20% lower on the new job than the old job and for workers 62 and older, wages are 27% lower on the new job. Even if they voluntarily quit their previous jobs, older workers’ (51 and older) wages decrease by 5%. Moreover, older workers who change jobs in their fifties experience longer spells of unemployment compared to older workers who do not."
Go here -> https://www.economicpolicyresearch.org/jobs-report/older-workers-know-they-face-an-unfriendly-labor-market


"Why Older Workers Fear The Labor Market," Teresa Ghilarducci, Forbes, February 10, 2020
"Common sense and economic research connect eroding retirement security to job insecurity. We should look for ways to help older workers feel confident in the job market. But if there is going to be a confidence gap between older and younger workers when it comes to quitting, we should at least make sure older workers have a solid fallback position: good, dependable pensions. Strong pensions make for strong bargaining power—something all workers deserve."
Go here -> https://www.forbes.com/sites/teresaghilarducci/2020/02/10/why-older-workers-fear-the-labor-market/#66fdb1e66f9f


"Can Corporate America Get Behind Medicare for All?-One man’s crusade to sell big business on a health care overhaul," Libby Watson, New Republic, February 14, 2020
"A few days before Christmas in 2007, Wendell Potter was in his office at the health insurer Cigna’s building in Philadelphia, watching CNN. A protest was being held outside Cigna’s Glendale, California, office—not, as one might expect, to demand health care reform, but to force the company to save the life of a young woman with Cigna insurance, Nataline Sar­kisyan. Years earlier, Sarkisyan had been diagnosed with leukemia, and now, at 17, she’d developed complications; without a liver transplant, she would only have days to live. Cigna initially refused to cover the procedure, calling it “experimental.” But after a nightmarish week, Potter finally got some good news: His bosses at Cigna had agreed to reverse their decision and approve payment for the transplant."
Go here -> https://newrepublic.com/article/156381/wendell-potter-big-business-corporate-support-medicare-all


"As Health Care Costs Rise, Workers At Low-Wage Firms May Pay A Larger Share," Michelle Andrews, Kaiser Family Foundation, September 25, 2019
"Health insurance premiums and deductibles for job-based coverage edged upward in 2019, surpassing increases in both wages and inflation, according to an annual employer survey of more than 2,000 employers released Wednesday. But the results were uneven, and many workers least able to afford it were confronted with higher-than-average costs.

People at companies with large numbers of lower-wage employees faced bigger deductibles for single coverage and were asked to pony up a larger share of their incomes to pay premiums than those at firms with fewer people with low earnings, according to the annual employer health benefits survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation. (KHN is an editorially independent program of the foundation.)"
Go here ->  https://khn.org/news/health-care-costs-employer-survey-workers-at-lower-wage-firms-may-have-higher-costs/


Wisconsin Examiner-Digging up the Truth in the Badger State, 2020
News in Wisconsin is increasingly controlled by out-of-state corporate interests.  Coupled with the demise of a number of local news outlets, it's hard to find information on what's happening in our state.  I've located a few outlets you may not be familiar with.  None of them have a paywall.  Check them out. The Wisconsin Examiner is one of the new Wisconsin-focused media.
"The Wisconsin Examiner is a nonpartisan, nonprofit news site offering a fresh perspective on politics and policy in our state. As the largest news bureau covering state government, the Examiner will offer investigative reporting and daily coverage dedicated to the public interest.

In Wisconsin’s great progressive tradition, we aim to hold the powerful accountable to the people, follow the money, and dig out the truth. Although we give you the inside scoop, we are not a publication for “insiders.” Instead, we cover stories and voices that too often go unheard.

We don’t accept advertising or sell subscriptions. Instead, we rely on the generous support of foundations and people like you, who care about Wisconsin and believe an informed public is crucial to a healthy democracy.

We take our inspiration from the motto emblazoned on a ceiling in our state Capitol: “The Will of the People Is the Law of the Land.”
Check it out here -> https://wisconsinexaminer.com/


"Influence Peddler of the Month," Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, 2020
"On Wisconsin.
Do you want to know who is secretly wielding power in Wisconsin’s capitol?

In our feature, “Influence Peddler of the Month,” the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign takes you behind the scenes and calls out the players."
Go here -> https://www.wisdc.org/news/influence-peddler-of-the-month


"Report: Donald Trump had a lot of questions about badgers," Matthew DeFour, Wisconsin State Journal, February 13, 2020
"A new book reveals President Donald Trump had a lot of questions about badgers in the early months of his presidency, according to a report from Business Insider.

Trump would ask Reince Priebus, his first White House chief of staff who hails from Wisconsin, whether badgers are "mean to people," how they "work," and how aggressive they can get, according to "Sinking in the Swamp: How Trump's Minions and Misfits Poisoned Washington," by Daily Beast reporters Lachlan Markay and Asawin Suebsaeng.

According to the book:"
Go here ->  https://madison.com/wsj/news/local/govt-and-politics/report-donald-trump-had-a-lot-of-questions-about-badgers/article_731f6069-67d6-5fc7-abe3-bf4bb95e54ca.html