title: Partnership long-term care insurance: lessons for CLASS program development.
abstract: The Community Living Assistance Services and Supports (CLASS) Act was a voluntary public insurance strategy intended to help people pay for long-term care. CLASS was passed as part of health reform to overcome aspects of private long-term care insurance market failure but came under close scrutiny from both its supporters and its detractors. Experience with the long-term care insurance market and State Partnership Programs provide insights about how to make CLASS fiscally viable. A CLASS program that offered one set of options to cover front-end risk (e.g., 1 to 3 years) and another set to cover catastrophic risk (after a high deductible) could have been offered as an alternative to the basic CLASS "long and lean" benefit model with all enrollees joined into a single risk pool. This would have broadened the risk pool and lowered premium costs under the program.
authors.affiliation: George Mason University, Fairfax, VA 22124, USA. mmeiners@gmu.edu
authors.forename: Mark R
authors.initials: MR
authors.lastname: Meiners
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D006078:Government Programs; D018166:Health Care Reform; D006699:Home Care Services / Q000191:economics*; D006801:Humans; D007353:Insurance, Long-Term Care / Q000191:economics; D008134:Long-Term Care / Q000458:organization & administration*; D016730:Program Development; D055818:Public-Private Sector Partnerships; D012112:Residential Facilities / Q000191:economics*; D012946:Social Welfare / Q000191:economics; D014481:United States