Advice from a small town girl

A wonderful person passed away recently, and I feel compelled to remark upon it. Not only because this particular person is now gone, but because, with her, a bit more of a particular ethos, one that we see too little of today, died as well.

I don’t remember the particular circumstances of the conversation, but something this woman said to me several years ago, when she was already in her eighties, has stuck with me.

And not always in a comfortable way.

She told me that she had not yet drawn Social Security, and that she would not draw it unless she needed it, because that wasn’t what it was for. She said she believed that Social Security was for those who needed it, and she did not. Her resources were sufficient.

Now, I don’t know if she ever did draw benefits from the Social Security system, and it doesn’t matter to me.

What does matter is that she saw the intention behind a program that we all assume is our due.

“By golly, I earned that money and I’m going to get it as soon as I can!” seems to be the way most of us view our potential government benefits.

Including me and my family.

When I was younger, my family incorporated the family farm. The intention, as I understood it then, was to avoid having to sell the farm to pay the inheritance tax on the farm if something should happen to my father.

I really don’t have much to quibble about there, although I have a (weird and not often discussed) philosophical belief that none of us should be allowed to inherit anything.

Since then, my family, on the advice of professionals such as lawyers and accountants, has done quite a bit of finagling to ensure that the family farm remains just that. A family farm.

Still seems OK to me. My grandfather bought the place in the 1920s (it was originally homesteaded by Germans from Russia, but that’s another story) and my father worked hard to build it into a thriving farm and seed business. My brother is in charge today, and his son will be eventually.

Where I started having issues was a few years ago, when on the advice of those same professionals, we transferred assets to a limited liability corporation, impoverishing my parents so that they would be eligible for government programs.

The explanation, which seemed reasonable at the time, was that if either of them needed long-term care, they would be eligible for Medicaid, which would provide the basics, and we could pay for extras out of the LLC.

Today, I think I might have a problem with that.

In fact, I might have several problems with that.

1) My parents were not without resources. They worked hard and saved and invested, like good little ants. They did all the things responsible people do.

2) Has anyone considered that a health care system that can swallow an entire life’s worth of savings, virtually overnight, might need some adjustment?

3) Has anyone considered that the “entitlement” programs might have funding issues because we don’t really use them as they were intended? Have we considered that the problem isn’t cheats or frauds, but people like us?

4) For a bunch of avowed conservatives (the rest of the family, anyway), we sure were in a hurry to take advantage of a program that we don’t like.

More later.