11. Concluding Comments

Abstract

The time to consider our futures, who will care for us when we are the sick and the aged, is now! Today, the answer to that question is often the skilled nursing facility, the most expensive way for society to bundle off the chronic health problems associated with aging. As the elderly increase as a portion of the population, the increase in payments for LTC will cause a massive redistribution of wealth, far outstripping inheritance taxes and other mechanisms for transferring wealth from one generation to another. It will eat away at our national savings and the domino effect it generates may affect the housing industry, industrial investments and other forms of industry reliant upon a ready supply of capital.