The Next Retirement Crisis: America’s Public Pensions

Back in 2013, I blogged on Next Avenue about the excellent PBS FRONTLINE documentary, The Retirement Gamble, where correspondent Martin Smith reported on America’s troubling retirement savings crisis. He’s now back with a riveting sequel airing Tuesday… Continue reading

Why Do Climate Change Discussions Ignore Boomers?

(This article was written by a member of the 2018-2019 Encore Public Voices Fellows Program.) The landmark report issued last week by the United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change,  the international body for assessing climate change, w… Continue reading

8 Myths About Aging and Long-Term Care

(Excerpted with permission of the publisher, Wiley, from Navigating Your Later Years For Dummies by Carol Levine and AARP. Copyright © 2018 by AARP. All rights reserved. Available wherever books and eBooks are sold.) There are eight myths about aging a… Continue reading

Can Bundled Medical Payments Save You Money?

Two of the most upsetting things for patients are the high cost of health care and the surprise — sometimes indecipherable, sometimes nonstop — hospital bills. But something known as “bundled medical payments” might relieve both of those and possibly p… Continue reading

Congress Targets Misuse of Hospice Opioid Medications

(This article appeared previously in Kaiser Health News.) Hospice workers would be allowed to destroy patients’ unneeded opioids, reducing the risk that families misuse them, according to one little-noticed provision in the bipartisan opioids bill head… Continue reading

What Older Voters Want in the Midterm Elections

Older voters could be a decisive bloc in the midterm elections, particularly since recent polls have showed registered voters 65+ leaning decisively towards Democratic congressional candidates, a sharp reversal from previous election cycles. An NBC New… Continue reading

Medicare Fall Open Enrollment Advice

If you are enrolled in Medicare — the federal health insurance program for people 65 and older and some people with disabilities — you will soon have the opportunity to make changes to your health and prescription drug coverage. Medicare’s Fall Open En… Continue reading

How Retirement Housing Will Change for the Better

For a glimpse into the future of retirement communities and — pardon the odious term — “senior housing,” you couldn’t do much better than to ask Robert Kramer. He and several partners got together in 1991 to launch what has become the leading trade gro… Continue reading

How Medicare Coordinates With Employer Health Care

If you’re 65 or older, working and have an employer group health plan based on your current work, you may have questions about how your job-based insurance coordinates with Medicare. On our Medicare Rights Center National Consumer Helpline, such questi… Continue reading

Soon, You’ll Be Able to See Hospital Prices Online

(This article previously appeared on PolicyGenius.com.) Patients will be able to see a list of a hospital’s standard charges online starting Jan. 1, under guidelines proposed by the Trump administration. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services… Continue reading