Review of Reviews: “Medicaid Spend Down, Estate Recovery and Divorce: Doctrine, Planning and Policy,” 23 Elder L.J. (2015)Review of Reviews: “Medicaid Spend Down, Estate Recovery and Divorce: Doctrine, Planning and Policy,” 23 Elder L.J. (2015)

For estate planners today, mere awareness of elder law, particularly planning for Medicaid eligibility, is barely enough: Fluency is quickly becoming the norm. Many planners have discovered that the Medicaid rules are every bit as arcane, difficult and—dare one say, arbitrary—as the transfer tax rules and, just like tax planning, require consideration of federal law and potentially the law of several states.

Into this environment comes Professor John A. Miller with a provocative thesis: In many instances, divorce is the best Medicaid strategy for married couples, even though, in most other contexts, the law favors marriage over divorce. I’ll return to this thesis in a moment but first should mention that this article follows the earlier “...