Obama’s new Health Care Law introduced a voluntary national long-term care insurance program which hoped to make Medicaid benefits readily available to those living at home. A National Long Term Care System was created by the Community Living Assistance Services and Supports Act (CLASS Act) in America for the first time. The CLASS Act hoped to make long term care services more affordable in the US.

This new Long Term Care Program was to be funded by premiums collected by the program participants. The premiums ranging in the $100 - $200 for this program was to be collected through pay roll deduction. The main idea behind collecting premiums for this program was to ensure that tax dollars would not be used to fund this Act.

Late 2011 media sources confirmed that this long term care program was shelved because authorities realised that it couldn’t be sustained without using the tax payer money. The CLASS Act, for an affordable premium, guaranteed working adults at leat $50 a day if they became disabled and needed long term care. Health and Human Services concluded that it was not possible to keep this solvent because participation was voluntary.

The main flaw in this program was because it was voluntary, few healthy people would choose to pay a premium for services thay may never need. Without the healthy people paying into the system, it would not be possible to keep premiums affordable for those who wished to participate. What this means is, people most likely needing long term care benefits would be the ones who were going to disproportionately sign up, which would result in more bad risks and not enough good risks in the insurance pool.

Though the CLASS Act failed, it yielded valuable information which will help design a better program in the future. Though it is a very noble idea to have some sort of universal long term care program coverage, the sustainability of such a program requires people to participate in this program even if they are healthy. But this assumption has been one of the most controversial aspects of the law as many feel that it is an unconstitutional use of federal power.
The failure of the CLASS Act does not change the dire need for a program which would make long term care more affordable in the US.