Care fees to be limited to £35K, Cameron pledges to end forcing elderly to sell homes

Gracchus_Babeuf

N1AK wrote: »

All the more reason to want a decent future for future generations. If the only way a sizable proportion of children have of getting a decent amount of cash is waiting for their elders to kick the bucket don't be shocked by the consequences.

What do you mean by a 'decent future'? Many 65 year olds (stop using the patronising word 'children') are waiting for their 90 year old parents to die in order to inherit something to enhance the pitiful state pension. Can you blame them? Many of these 65 year olds have children and grandchildren themselves to think about. Yes, you can be selfish and spend all your cash on fillet of beef and caviar, but who will that help? Not you and not your family. Nobody. As for standard of care, that needs to be regulated by the state, not left to the vagaries of the free market.

Gracchus_Babeuf

oldvicar wrote: »

You can only hope they will do the decent thing and buy the very best that I can afford .... I shall promise to come back and haunt them if they don't

An arrogant statement, to put it mildly. If you would be totally ga-ga by that time it will hardly matter to you if you sleep on silk sheets and eat from gold plated cutlery. You will get what your beneficiary sees fit to arrange for you - end of story.

FATBALLZ

Don't you just love this country, apparently teenagers can easily afford to carry a £50k debt with them for their whole working lives, but old people with 2 years to live can't afford to spend over £35k on care home fees because they'll need it after they're dead.

Loughton_Monkey

Gracchus_Babeuf wrote: »

How does it help the economy to see people selling their houses and then wasting the proceeds on long term care? At least money passed down can be spent in the general economy.

Simple!

Money 'passed down' as you say will be spent partly on foreign goods. Only a proportion will stay in UK.

People selling their houses to spend on long term care means that the same amount of money will [generally speaking] mean that a little bit more will stay in the UK. The proportion of care costs that go directly on wages (must be <100%) will, of course, go partially on foreign goods. But I strongly suspect less than the other scenario.

Wealth is measured in £notes. Transactions are always accounted for by double entry book keeping. Although it's surprisingly complex, it is theoretically possible to do an audit trail of the £2.10 you spent on a Starbucks coffee this morning.

Before you bought it, you had wealth of exactly £2.10 in coins in your pocket. It can be proven that after you bought it, the wealth of an entire army of people (Starbucks Plc, their staff, inland revenue, the landlord, the coffee importers, the coffee producers, the milk producers, the sugar producers.........) are, between them, wealthier exactly to the tune of £2.10.

It's wonderful to 'enrich' all these people and circulate money. This ensures that we all get a slice of the action. But the extent to which a proportion of this enriches a Chinese or Columbian person is not good for UK citizens.

Unless, of course, you are a foreigner and brought the £2.10 into UK from abroad.

BobQ

In fact HMRC rarely takes a slice. Statistics from year 2009-10 as follows:



Taken from http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/stats/inheritance_tax/commentary.pdf

and another thing too many people worry unnecessarily about.[/QUOTE]

I appreciate the urge to make an erudite sounding point but I did say "particularly". That is it does not add to weath but even less so if HMRC takes a slice. I never said anything about the frequency of this happening!

BobQ

Gracchus_Babeuf wrote: »

How does it help the economy to see people selling their houses and then wasting the proceeds on long term care? At least money passed down can be spent in the general economy.

I asked if you can prove the statement.

Its as broad as its long, the same money gets moved around. Money spent in the general economy may indeed stimulate it in a positive way. But who is to say it gets spent at all? If it is, it might just be spent on foreign imports. The money paid to the care homes will of course be spent on paying low wage jobs and enriching the owners who may also spend it on foreign imports. It does not increase wealth, just moves it around in a different way.:)

BobQ

Gracchus_Babeuf wrote: »

An arrogant statement, to put it mildly. If you would be totally ga-ga by that time it will hardly matter to you if you sleep on silk sheets and eat from gold plated cutlery. You will get what your beneficiary sees fit to arrange for you - end of story.

I think the arrogance is to assume that all beneficiaries will not act in the best interests of the person they are making decisions for.

the_flying_pig

FATBALLZ wrote: »

Don't you just love this country, apparently teenagers can easily afford to carry a £50k debt with them for their whole working lives, but old people with 2 years to live can't afford to spend over £35k on care home fees because they'll need it after they're dead.

Well they will. Being dead isn't cheap, you know.

oldvicar

the_flying_pig wrote: »

Well they will. Being dead isn't cheap, you know.

Yeah, the increasing cost of living is frightening for dead people. An advertorial for pre-paid funeral plans in the Telegraph said the cost of funerals is going up by 8% a year:eek:

oldvicar

Gracchus_Babeuf wrote: »

An arrogant statement, to put it mildly. If you would be totally ga-ga by that time it will hardly matter to you if you sleep on silk sheets and eat from gold plated cutlery. You will get what your beneficiary sees fit to arrange for you - end of story.

Don't be silly. Egyptian cotton sheets - with the 5hit scraped off - and steel cutlery - clean, with appetising food, and assistance if needed - will be fine.

Starched napkin and a nice drop of wine (crystal glass, naturally) with dinner perchance? I don't expect much