Up Date on Spend Down

There is a group of people in Michigan trying to reduce the impact that spend down has on personal income. I'm on the group, and thought I would provide an update on our progress.

Spend down is money that you have to pay each month for medical costs in order to qualify for Medicaid. The spend down is created if your income goes over the limits for Medicaid eligibility. Once you have incurred bills equal to your spend down, you are eligible for Medicaid for the rest of the month. Spend down is calculated every month.

I bet it already sounds awful, right?

Unless you are eligible for SSI, your spend down is your unearned income minus about $500.00. Living on $500.00 is not possible.

Now it really sounds awful.....

If you go to work and earn additional money, hal of it counts toward your spend down. It's like getting paid half of minimum wage for a minimum wage job.

I guess you can see why we are trying to change the rulkes for spend down.

Goal One: Make all earned income exempt from spend down.
Goal Two: Make the fall back income level (now around $500/month) the same as the SSI level (nearly $900/month).

As we get closer to these goals, I'll update you here in The Recovering Life.