GOP sees threat to long-term care
WASHINGTON -- Even as leading Democrats offered assurances to the contrary, government experts repeatedly warned that a new long-term care insurance plan could go belly up, saddling taxpayers with another underfunded benefit program, according to emails disclosed by congressional investigators.
Part of President Barack Obama's health care law, the program is in limbo as a congressional debt panel searches for budget savings and behind the scenes, administration officials scramble to find a viable financing formula.
A long-standing priority of the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.), the Community Living Assistance Services and Supports program, or CLASS, was spliced into the health care law despite nagging budget worries.
Administration emails and documents reveal that alarms were sounded earlier and more widely than previously thought. Congressional Republicans seeking repeal of the program provided the materials to The Associated Press.
"Seems like a recipe for disaster to me," William Marton, a senior aging policy official in the administration, wrote in an October 2009 email. -- AP
'It's difficult for us to find any skilled labor' A new poll blames Long Island's ever-rising cost of living, shortage of affordable homes and other factors for making it hard for employers to hire and retain employees. Newsday TV's Doug Geed reports.
'It's difficult for us to find any skilled labor' A new poll blames Long Island's ever-rising cost of living, shortage of affordable homes and other factors for making it hard for employers to hire and retain employees. Newsday TV's Doug Geed reports.
