NEWS RELEASE
Wednesday, May 24, 2006
FY ‘07 Budget Debate:
Nursing Home Tax Repeal
To: Members of the Massachusetts Senate
May 24, 2006
Re: FY ‘07 Budget Debate:
Nursing Home Tax Repeal
Amendment # 16
(Senators Brown, Timilty and Tucker);
Amendment # 750
(Senators Lees, Knapik, Brown, Hedlund, Tisei and Tarr)
Here is one you might be able to enthusiastically
support.
The Legislature recently passed a health care
reform bill that was meant to get more health care coverage and take
some pressure off Medicaid expenditures. Within this context, you
might want to stop punishing people who take responsibility for
their own nursing home care, and are not on Medicaid.
Presently, self-payers in nursing homes must pay
a tax of $10.99 a day for the “privilege” of not being on Medicaid.
People who do not cheat, do not hide or get rid of their assets, are
penalized by being forced to pay over $4,000 a year to take care of
Medicaid patients.
It is fine for society as a whole to take care of
the sick and elderly. It is wrong to tax the sick and elderly, many
of them Alzheimer’s patients, to pay more than their share of the
total society burden. This tax soon forces them onto the Medicaid
system, which they had planned to avoid for as long as possible.
We have found that many legislators are not aware
of this tax, which passed as part of the complex “fiscal crisis tax
increase” bill of 2002. Focus was on the income tax at the time.
Legislators promised that the income tax rollback
would continue when the fiscal crisis was over, and we still urge
this compliance with the will of the voters. For this reason, even
former Sen. President Tom Birmingham, former Senator Warren Tolman,
and former pro-tax activist Jim Braude have publicly said the tax
should be returned to 5% now.
The nursing home tax should be repealed on the
grounds of fairness to the most vulnerable taxpayers: the old, the
sick, and the honest. We hope you will vote for this amendment. A
version of it, filed by Sen. Fargo, has been reported favorably from
the Health Care Committee.
Thank you for your attention.
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