Blogger of Gloom and Doom

I was interviewed last week by a reporter doing a story on planning for health care expenses during retirement. As I ticked off the various items to consider I was getting pretty depressed. After all:

• Medicare premiums are rising --up 13% next year
• The new Medicare drug benefit is unsustainable: it will get more expensive and be cut back
• Employers are dropping retiree coverage
• It will be harder for most people to shed assets to qualify for Medicaid-based nursing home coverage. Meanwhile long term care insurance is generally unaffordable and poorly structured to protect upper middle class assets
• Income taxes are likely to rise to pay for the increasing deficit, which is partly caused by health care spending

My advice was:

• Save as much as possible
• Don't retire before qualifying for Medicare, because private insurance for someone in late middle age is usually costly and hard to get
• Eat well and stay in shape
• Consider moving to Costa Rica where everything is cheaper