Meet another one of the big losers in the Republican "Tax Cuts for Donald Trump" bill.
“Anybody who is paying for the cost of nursing home care is paying a great deal of money, and they are going to lose that deduction, and their taxes are going to go up,” said Thomas DeCoursey, a retired lawyer from Kansas, in his 70s.
He relies on the deduction to help offset costs associated with nursing home care for his wife, who has Alzheimer’s. Some of his own medical expenses also factor in. DeCoursey estimates that in a couple of years their annual costs will pass $100,000.
“There are a lot of people in my shoes,” said DeCoursey, who lives in Leawood, a well-to-do Kansas City suburb that voted for President Donald Trump last year.
Only about 6 percent of tax filers, or 9 million households, qualify for the deductions on medical expenses. But for those nine million middle- and upper-middle income families, it's helping to keep them financially afloat. The threat of eliminating this deduction, which accounts for a relatively minor hit to the government of $10 billion, is one of the reason the AARP is rallying members in opposition to the bill. "For people who are sick, many of whom are going to be older Americans, this medical expense deduction makes their health care more affordable,” said Cristina Martin Firvida a lobbyist for AARP. "To them, it is a very big deal."
Beyond long-term nursing home care, it gives a break for other major medical expenses like fertility treatments, expensive medical equipment for home health care, long-distance travel expenses for specialized care including cancer treatment centers, or extensive dental procedures. The expenses have to exceed 10 percent of income, in most cases, and can only be used for people itemizing deductions. So it's not a huge number of taxpayers, but for those people, it's a big deal.
As long as our healthcare system remains as messed up as it is, as long as medical expenses can break families financially, we need all the help we can get.