Monday, December 20, 2010
Counselors, don your capes...
Although the blog considers the application of real-world law to imaginary comic-book situations, the authors have a semi-serious angle:
"I think we both hope the blog has a certain educational component," such as insight into the thought process of attorneys in dealing with legal problems, says one of the two bloggers.
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
Estate planning for digital assets
All good questions and topics for consideration. Up until now, many of us attorneys advising clients simply shrugged and thought "don't we have more important things to deal with." However, a person's digital information may be very valuable, either setimentally or even financially.
The December 2010 issue of Wisconsin Lawyer, contains this excellent article examining issues and ideas related to dealing with one's digital assets, especially after one's death. A couple basic options include leaving a list or instructions about your information for your family members to follow after your death. A second, legal option may be to leave a list, that is incorporated into your will, and will be honored in the same way as a list of tangible personal property.
Review of guide for gay and lesbian couples
Monday, November 8, 2010
Paying for long-term care
Long-term care insurance has been around for several decades, yet many people roll the dice as to whether they purchase it or not. Besides the statistics of one's chances of needed expensive nursing home care, the article also looks at the reasons we often choose not to obtain such protection.
While some excuses for not having insurance are incorrect or somewhat inaccurate (e.g, thinking Medicare will pay (which it doesn't), expecting our own savings to be sufficient, and counting on family members to care for us), "there is also a great deal of justified skeptism about the long-term care insurance industy."
On that skeptical side, some insurance companies are looking at raising their premiums by double-digit increases.
Wisconsin's Office of the Commissioner of Insurance (OCI) has a helpful guide on its website. Furthermore, Wisconsin is one of a number of states that offers Long-Term Care Insurance Partnership program to encourage the purchase of long-term care insurance by offering greater asset limits for Medicaid coverage. Search the OCI website for more information on all related topics.
Monday, October 25, 2010
Mediating disputes involving elders
I previously posted about elder law mediation as presented in a public radio story.
The post from "The New Old Age" includes these cautions and suggestions for families who may be considering mediation for such a dispute:
A mediator generally should be trained in such subjects as the physical and mental effects of aging and how to communicate effectively with the elderly. But in a field with no national credentialing and no standard approach, potential clients should be wary before asking an outsider to sit in on a dispute.
Start with National Eldercare Mediation Network, . . . which posts profiles of elder mediators in all 50 states. Another Web site, Mediate.com, also allows prospective clients to search elder mediators by state.
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Aiming for 100+
Last year, I posted about a collection of stories from diverse and interesting centenarians.
Monday, October 18, 2010
More on financial powers of attorney
For an extensive explanation, see this article in the June 2010 Wisconsin Lawyer magazine (the Wisconsin state bar's official publication). I wrote the article's sidebar about the new law's state form.
Powers of attorney must be on people's minds lately. See this "ask the expert" column from the New York Times' blog about aging. Although the answer to the question may be correct in some states, it is not entirely correct under Wisconsin's new law. In Wisconsin, coagents can act independently unless the power of attorney specifies otherwise. As in most cases, legal questions have many nuances and an inquiry with an attorney in the relevant state is very helpful.
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
Who will draft your will?
In the end, the documents themselves are only part of the picture, whether you prepare your own estate planning documents or have an attorney draft them for you. The BIGGEST benefit of having an attorney assist with estate planning is the ADVICE. Legal counsel is especially important in complex situations like remarriage, potentially disagreeable family members, or a likely beneficiary with disabilities. An attorney provides the options, answers, and information for planning how one's estate will be handled and how surviving family members will be provided for. Then, the document drafting follows the conversation, with documents to carry out the plan.
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
Wisconsin's new Power of Attorney Act
Because the new law is so extensive, I will break up my comments on it into several topics. For now, I will simply link to the new chapter in the Wisconsin Statutes. (Just for comparison, the new law has an entire chapter in the statutes, where the predecessor statute was only a couple sections amounting to just a few pages.)
Thursday, September 2, 2010
Summer coming to an end with a family travel story
Here's an introductory quotation about the family history potential for such travels:
"Traveling with parents to places that were important in their earlier lives can be important and meaningful for their life review and give the younger generations traveling with them insights into the ways that their parents' or grandparents' lives have shaped their own," says USC psychologist Bob Knight.
I enjoyed the story recounted in the piece where the elderly mother turned off her hearing aid during the road trip so that her travel companions (aka her adult daughters) could "talk about her."
Besides the family history dimension, the intergenerational connections can be priceless. So often we segregate ourselves, not just in society, but even in our families, by age.
Last January, I enjoyed a relaxing vacation to Maui with my partner and my mother. We enjoyed the sun, food, beaches, and activities with great memories together. The photo above is shot from our balcony where we enjoyed the warm weather and watched the whales in the channel.
(After a summer break from writing, I've resumed posts now as of September 2.)
Friday, April 23, 2010
When older parents get remarried
Without careful planning, the adult children and the surviving spouse may be at odds, even to the extent of fighting over an estate in court. For example,
Most lawyers and financial planners agree that the families that get cross-ways are those that don't communicate. [An Atlanta attorney] says there is a saying in the field: "People get over the loss of a loved one sooner than the loss of an inheritance."
Monday, March 1, 2010
Golden (years) opportunities
Than youth itself, though in another dress,
And as the evening twilight fades away
The sky is filled with stars, invisible by day.
Monday, February 15, 2010
Korean scholars revisit international adoptions from Korea
Concerning the numbers for 2009,
With the international trend clearly turning toward domestic solutions and family preservation, we may wonder why over 1,080 babies went to the U.S. from South Korea this year for adoption.The authors continue by pointing out the legal (and fading cultural) bias against unwed mothers. That bias has been the engine behind moving the children of those unwed mothers into adoption, rather than promoting family preservation or even domestic adoption within Korea. The writers note that the laws are changing to accomodate a longer period for a mother to consider placing her child for adoption, but they encourage that much more be done to improve the attitude and process of adoption in Korea.
Fascinating perspective.
Monday, January 18, 2010
Work and meaning in hard economic times
Here's part of the essay:
The items [the center shipped in orders] ranged from T-shirts and teddy bears to coffee mugs and casserole dishes.
. . . The pay was $12 an hour, before taxes, with no health coverage, sick leave or other benefits. During the first few weeks, I sat in a chair all day and typed in orders, a far cry from my early days as a lawyer representing clients with household names.
Right after I got my first paycheck, my car broke down, and heating-oil money was diverted to the repair shop. During Week 2, the 20 to 25 hours I thought I’d be working dwindled to 13. But I called a halt to my pity party when I counted up all my friends who lost their jobs in 2009. And that’s when I began to feel satisfaction from the work I did get. Although the job involved inputting product codes and shipping data for several hours at a time, it somehow got me in touch with real people with real lives in real towns. And it gave me glimpses into worlds other than my own that, for at least the course of a workday, melted preoccupation with my own troubles.