I thought (and I admit not to being an expert here) that one of the issues was that they were trying to basically bankrupt people who got a particular kind of illness.
Now, you might say, well they got a very expensive kind of illness, and so they should pay for it, because someone has to pay for it.
But, applying the "veil of ignorance" test, of not knowing whether you or your family will be struck by such a disease in the future, it would seem a system where everyone effectively pays insurance to guard against the highly negative outcome would be fairest and most sensible outcome.
I see parallels to the current healthcare fight in America, which seems to take advantage of people's strong belief that "it won't happen to me" to form policy, rather than actual statistics and a general right wing antipathy to these kinds of solutions. I guess it's easier to sell potential bankruptcy to people when they're young and healthy than a 100% certain tax rise.
> I thought (and I admit not to being an expert here) that one of the issues was that they were trying to basically bankrupt people who got a particular kind of illness.
It was nick-named 'the dementia tax', although that aspect of it was only half accurate, it depends on whether the case was severe enough to need to go into a care home.
Residential care (in a care home) already has to be paid for by the person receiving it. The difference is that now you have to pay the money up front until your assets go down to £23k, which usually means being forced to sell any property to release funds, whereas this bill increased the limit to £100k, and postponed payment so that it came out of your estate after death.
The major change was that care in your own home was going to be subject to the same system, whereas at the moment it is paid for by the state, albeit only available patchily. But a lot of this in-home care is going to be quite limited, I remember with my own grandparents the major help they received was someone coming in to give a bath once a week. That was probably only about £30 a week (£1500 a year) in costs, frankly it would have been better if they had received more care, and more money had come out of their property. If you are the child, and you begrudge £20-100k coming out of your inheritance so that your elderly relatives can be properly looked after, I don't exactly sympathize.
I agree with you about the insurance aspect of it, and that was what was recommended by a cross-party (that is, bipartisan) commission. The problem I see with that is that inheritance taxes are very unpopular, and the more you sever the link between the tax, and the thing that is being paid for, the more that people will object. But I agree that is what should happen, let's hope this 'dementia tax' label doesn't stick to those efforts as well.
Now, you might say, well they got a very expensive kind of illness, and so they should pay for it, because someone has to pay for it.
But, applying the "veil of ignorance" test, of not knowing whether you or your family will be struck by such a disease in the future, it would seem a system where everyone effectively pays insurance to guard against the highly negative outcome would be fairest and most sensible outcome.
I see parallels to the current healthcare fight in America, which seems to take advantage of people's strong belief that "it won't happen to me" to form policy, rather than actual statistics and a general right wing antipathy to these kinds of solutions. I guess it's easier to sell potential bankruptcy to people when they're young and healthy than a 100% certain tax rise.