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It’s not always easy to be in the latter stages of your life. You are faced with the idea that your kids have grown up and no longer need your constant guidance and often find it more challenging to make time for you. Your spouse may have passed on or you have been divorced for a while. You are on a fixed income and finding out slowly but surely there are a lot of challenges in your way. But thankfully there is the American government to protect you.
Thanks to the elder laws that are in place now, the older Americans have the protection they need. It all began as the Older Americans Act which was signed into the law by president Lyndon Johnson in 1965. This does not include just one law. It includes an umbrella effect of laws such as estate planning and wills. This means that older Americans have the right to decide what they want to do when they are on life support and how they want their estate to be handled once they pass on. This gave them the power to not feel like they are without control once they pass on.
Elder law also covers Medicaid and disability coverage. As seniors get older they needed some help taking care of themselves, especially with the rising cost of health care even in the 1960’s and there wasn’t the presence of services like debt consolidation then. The elder law stepped in and made the elderly eligible for health care benefits, covering doctors and hospital visits. It has since been expanded to cover diabetes testing supplies.
These laws were in place for elderly people who didn’t have family to help take care of them and were getting to an age where it was difficult to take care of themselves. Elder laws helped make life for seniors a little more manageable.
