Elder Law Articles
The Social Security Administration (SSA) allows recipients of Social Security benefits to check their benefits information online, change their information for direct deposit, and accomplish other tasks. The online accounts, called “my Social Security,” are available at www.socialsecurity.gov/myaccount. To create an account, you must be at least 18 years of age, and have a Social [...]
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The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) provides low-income Americans with financial assistance to buy groceries, and many older Americans rely on it. However, only about a third of eligible seniors participate in the program, perhaps from a mistaken understanding of who is eligible and how much assistance is available. Seniors need to know about SNAP’s [...]
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More women tend to need long-term care coverage, and they will be paying more for it. Prices for long-term care insurance will soon reflect the reality that women live longer and file more claims than men. That change could mean significant upheaval in an already confusing and unpredictable market—and for some women who have been [...]
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The NAEPC Education Foundation and the National Association of Estate Planners & Councils (NAEPC) are promoting April 2013 as National Financial Literacy Month. The goal of the awareness campaign is to help the American public learn how to keep their financial and estate plans up to date. Financial Literacy Month was officially designated by a [...]
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Women coming home from military service are joining the ranks of the homeless in the U.S. The male former service members who become homeless after returning to the States largely do so when battling mental illness and/or substance abuse issues. Female vets come home with those issues as well as a tougher time finding gainful [...]
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A report by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has confirmed that disabled veterans continue to face unreasonable delays in receiving benefits. According to the report, the average time to process a veteran’s disability claim is 272 days, an increase of 40 percent since 2011. Every day approximately 53 veterans die while waiting for [...]
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Congress has renewed a charitable rollover provision for individual retirement accounts (IRAs) that applies to people age 70-and-a-half and older. The provision had expired and has now been renewed through the end of 2013. The provision has several tax benefits. IRA owners who meet the minimum age requirement can donate up to $100,000 directly from [...]
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New York seniors are getting a prescription price break. According to the AARP, almost 300,000 New York seniors enrolled under the state’s Elderly Pharmaceutical Insurance Coverage (EPIC) program are slated to receive co-payment assistance this year. Co-payment assistance, canceled due to budget constraints, was restored in the state’s budget as of January 1, 2013, though [...]
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Life insurance plays an important part in your estate plan, especially if you have young children or a spouse or family member with a disability who depends on you for support. Life insurance can be especially helpful in providing immediate cash at death, which is often needed for funeral expenses and to pay the debts [...]
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The two-week-old strike by New York City school bus drivers will continue, as the city rejected the union’s proposal for a “cooling-off period” during which the drivers would return to work and the city would stop seeking bids for a new bus contract. The strike has disproportionately affected students with special needs. Only 152,000 of [...]
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