Marian Sunabe drives to visit her 100-year-old mother in Gardena from her home in South Pasadena, and once a week or so, I tagged it on a recent morning about the serious expenses of elderly care.
Retired school psychologist Sunabe said her mother had an independent mind, loved the comfort of her home and did not want to move with Sunabe or her brother. Reiko Kobata has a daytime caregiver for the past four years. But recently, after falling and falling ill with pneumonia, a night care worker has been added at times.
The daytime label for 13.5 hours of shifts is $320. The 11-hour night shift costs less than $300, bringing the daily total to $620.
Reiko Kobata, 100, enjoys visits from her daughter Marian Sunabe.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
Monthly price increase of up to $18,600. When night shift caregivers are not required, the amount is about half.
“Most people won't be able to afford it. But there's no other option than to acknowledge it to the board and nursing facilities,” Sunabe said in an email that even a few thousand dollars could run a month. “I know those who have to quit…care for the age of their parents.
In fact, this is a national crisis, and the United States lags behind many developed countries as the global population ages rapidly.
“Americans are not prepared for the care challenge,” said Paul Irving, a senior consultant at the Milken Institute. “Families eventually learn that basic care is not covered by health insurance, “and it’s so incredible that more and more middle-class Americans are forced to repay poverty so that they qualify for Medicaid. It’s a crazy system for them and our federal government.”
Given the axe assignment, this may not be a longer option Medicaid by the Trump administration and Congress.
As Sunabe and I drove south, I told her about my friends Morrie Markoffhis life is 110. But he and Sunabe's mother were not the norm. I've written it, too 102-year-old World War II Veterinarian Paul Hult quickly burned his life after falling and requiring care at home.
Sunabe cleverly cut the columns of numbers for me on a lined piece of paper, outlining the maths her mother cared for. Kobata is centralizing social security, income, pension, long-term care insurance and retirement savings on the leased property she and her late husband own to cover the $18,600 monthly bill.
Reiko Kobata, 100, has a picture of herself at her 29-year-old at her home in Gardena.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
Kobata pays for an agency that provides and makes up for caregivers. In such an arrangement, the total number of agents is as high as half. This may provide caregivers with near-minimum wages, making it difficult to recruit more people to an industry with severe labor shortage.
As a result, many caregivers have no documents and delete books. This saves customers because the agents have no disagreements. And, many caregivers get free space and boards while on duty, but sacrifice their privacy and time with their family.
Women from the Philippines (some have legal status, some have no legal status), make up a considerable part of the California labor force. As I reported, some of them share barrack-style housing, many of which are Fear of being deported Currently, due to immigration attacks by the Trump administration.
So what we're witnessing is a huge public policy failure, which doesn't seem to be a wave of age (a champion for decades) that might be surprising. Number of California Institute of Public Policy Programs in 2040 Californians 65 and older will reach 9 millionaccounting for 22% of the population, up from 14% in 2020.
When necessary, more and more families will resort to a rather common approach in immigration culture. They will take good care of themselves, live together, do a lot of juggling, and hopefully they won't go bankrupt with medical services when needed.
Sunabe left Highway 110 and drove through the Gardena street where she once walked to school. As we approached the family home, she told me that her mother still likes to write checks in person to pay the bills, but did not track her own total care costs.
“Sometimes she asks, ‘What the hell does this money do?’” Sunabe said.
Sunabe parked in the driveway of the house where she grew up. Her parents bought it for $13,000 about 65 years ago when Harold Kobata worked as a chemical engineer while his wife was a teacher's assistant and school office assistant.
Kobata entered the living room with Walker, but otherwise seemed in a miraculous physical health, or even better spirit. Her grandson stayed with her grandmother while working as a sushi chef at a nearby restaurant and he was going to transfer.
Reiko Kobata looked at a photo manual and her family did it for her 100th birthday in her living room at Gardena's home.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
Kobata settled on the sofa with family photos leaning against a wall. She told me she loved walking around the neighborhood in the mornings, spreading out LA time every day, and reading the whole piece of paper before and after. She leans towards her garden, plays cards on the computer, follows the Dodgers, and has her favorite player, Shohei Ohtani.
I told Kobata that she didn't look like she didn't look 100.
“How do you feel?” I asked.
“I don't know,” she said. “How should you feel?”
She thought about it and said she felt about 90.
We made a two-hour visit, but I didn't want Kobata to take a nap. On her journey back to South Pasadena, Sunabe said her mother’s situation is sustainable for the time being, but she wants to know about the broader social challenges.
“If you’ve been in the house for so long that you don’t want to move out because it’s so comfortable and familiar, then you might be fair,” she said. “And if you’re going to narrow down or go into a more public environment, you can solve the quarantine and care issues by cashing out that equity.”
For some, it is an option, as well as unpaid help from relatives or friends, National Programs for Provide Limited Care For low-income and elderly residents.
However, there is no simple or cheap solution Irving and UCLA Emeritus Professor Fernando Torres-Gilhe also appeared in “care” and said that when he was asked to advise on elderly care, he had two words of response: “You're screwed up.”
Torres-Gil said that in the middle of the last century, the United States made substantial investments in institutional care, making “a huge for-profit industry that can be held.” Instead, other countries invest in community- and family-centric care for public financing, including Singapore, Japan, Taiwan and South Korea.
“We are behind the curve,” Owen said. “We are the only developed country…there is no universal health care system, resulting in high rates of chronic illness, shorter health spans and life expectancy…If you call it a system – if you call it a system – our presbyterians fail. Assisted living communities and nursing homes are not affordable for most Americans.”
Ironically, the only hope may be the age wave itself. As more and more people eliminate, policy makers may find it difficult to ignore the cost of their crying.
steve.lopez@latimes.com
