Introduction
“Long-term care is a national healthcare crisis.” – Dan Murphy, executive director, Northwest Regional Council, Area Agencies on Aging
The nation’s long-term care system has struggled for many years, and those constraints are expected to deepen as our nation ages. One in five Americans is projected to be 65 years old or older by 2030, outnumbering children for the first time in our nation’s history. While seven in 10 will eventually require long-term care, currently, more than 90 percent of Americans are not insured for long-term care and do not have access to affordable, high-quality options for long-term services and supports.
In 2019, Washington State became the first in the United States to pass legislation that would enable a public state-operated long-term care insurance program. The Washington Cares Fund, borne out of this legislation, will provide a lifetime benefit of $36,500 per enrollee for certain medical, personal, and social services starting in January 2025. The fund will grow beginning in January 2022 as individuals working in Washington State pay 58 cents toward the fund for every $100 earned. The state is in the process of designing this program and wants to make sure that it is easy to access and supports the needs of those who will be its beneficiaries.
Many advocates also want to ensure that the Washington Cares Fund is easily accessible and supports the needs of its beneficiaries. Over an eight-week period in late March through May 2021, the New Practice Lab partnered with the SEIU 775, which represents over 45,000 home care and nursing home workers in Washington and Montana, to understand how individuals might navigate the fund. The goal of our research was to identify concrete ways for Washington State to implement the fund so that it is accessible to all and that it supports living-wage jobs for care workers.
In this report, we discuss our research methods, we present personas of individuals seeking long-term supports and services from the fund, and we offer a list of recommendations that, while intended for Washington State, we see as applicable to other states that will embark on offering similar long-term services to residents.