July 3, 2025

By Jim Towey

The traditional Fourth of July fireworks show scheduled for tomorrow seems awfully anticlimactic. How can dazzling fanfare in the heavens above Washington outdo the Trump-Musk pyrotechnics down below?

The “Big, Beautiful Bill” now under consideration in Congress will do nothing to address the grave challenges the retirement of the massive Baby Boom generation now presents to America.

The Wall Street Journal reported that the trustees of Social Security have moved the trust fund’s insolvency date forward and therefore, beneficiaries may see cuts within eight years. Medicare’s hospital fund faces insolvency by 2033. That means cuts are coming there, too.

Presently over 20 million senior citizens in Americans live on their SS checks. With nursing homes at about $10,000 a month and assisted living at about half that amount, most people cannot afford institutional caregiving. They must make do at home with the help of family or friends, if they even have any.

We shall see whether Medicaid nursing home reimbursement rates are cut by the president and Congress.  Medicaid is basically the only program that funds nursing home care for the elderly poor. The reality is the “age wave” may become an “age tsunami,” and nowhere will this be felt more than in America’s long-term care institutions where our country’s most dependent citizens live.

Nursing home care

I spent time in nursing homes in Milwaukee and Boston last week. I guess you could call these visits a trip down “no memory lane” as both facilities were populated with patients with Alzheimer’s Disease or related mental illnesses.

First, a word about the people who work in long-term care. During the Covid pandemic, a great deal of attention was focused on these institutions. I wrote about it myself. Where would we have been if it weren’t for the caregivers at the nursing homes and assisted living facilities who labored heroically under the most trying of conditions?

The media may have moved on to more sexy stories, but the demands facing these brave women and men didn’t. The physicians and nursing professionals and their assistants, the physical and speech therapists, and the social workers and activity coordinators, continue to do the same quiet, humble and demanding work that America wants done but few want to do. No caregiving task is more trying than helping the elderly who cannot cope. Caring for babies with diaper emergencies seems different from helping an old person when nature calls. The cries of the anguished elderly are hard to hear and invite special compassion. The chorus of these cries gets louder and louder by the day as the U.S. ages. Over 2.5 million Americans no longer can care for themselves and require the kind of attention that nursing homes and assisted living facilities offer 24/7. The employees in these homes deserve our gratitude – and better compensation.

The memory care facility I visited in Milwaukee’s suburbs is where two longtime friends and supporters of Aging with Dignity reside. They have been married for 65 years and are now united very specially as they experience dementia together. The triumph of their marital love and deep bond of affection greatly surpass the limitations they now experience together. Their love perdures. They aren’t their illnesses, even if parts of them seem to be long gone. They remain equally precious in God’s eyes and in those of their five children and many grandchildren who are committed to them.

Who will care?

But my two friends are the exception, not the rule. They are fortunate to have accumulated sufficient wealth from a lifetime of work and investments to be able to afford their illnesses. Based on their ages and health conditions, she is likely to outlive him. Among women 75 and older, two out of five live alone, comprising part of the army of over 16 million American seniors flying solo. For those with small SS checks and little savings, they could be in for a bumpy flight. Who will care for them? Who will step in and help childless couples of limited means when the first signs of dementia set in? Women typically live another 15 years after the loss of their spouse – to whom do these women turn for help?

Maybe America needs a Dependence Day that focuses on the great human dignity and the needs of the elderly, disabled and others who live at the mercy of society. Their lives matter and how we treat them determines how great America truly is. They should rank among the first priorities of government.

Independence Day reminds us of the freedoms we Americans often take for granted, freedoms that tens of millions of our seniors helped preserve and protect. These men and women now need our assistance. Will their cries be drowned out by all of the fireworks in Washington?

(The views expressed herein are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Aging with Dignity and/or its Board of Directors)