You Can't Take It With You

BALTIMORE — The cost of living is high enough, but the cost of dying is astronomical.

When our family matriarch died at age 100, the funeral home offered to sell us a $350 burial dress.

We passed.

One good thing about dying is no matter what you wear at your funeral, it won't make you look fat.

Some racket, the death business.

By the time you put someone six feet under, you're shy six figures. Most families plan for the burial plot, but are unprepared for the financial plot.

It's not as though you can back up the pickup and tow your dead kin from her house to the funeral home. They have laws against that sort of thing — and for good reason. I'd hate to be on the freeway and look over to the carpool lane to see a stiff in the passenger seat next to some guy on a cell phone.

After that last breath is when the meter starts running in the death business. Taking the body away could start at $350 and go higher, depending on where the person died and where they will be buried.

When a loved one dies, your emotions ratchet up and before long, you find yourself in an eternal MasterCard commercial where every funereal add-on becomes ridiculously priceless. Yes, of course, you say, we must have a toile casket liner, fly in Il Divo for a solo and have Maya Angelou do the Old Testament reading.

For my grandmother's sendoff, the family paid for the release of white doves at the cemetery. I kid you not.

People are living longer. That also means adult children, some raising children and grandchildren, are taking on elderly care. Most caregivers are women because we outlive our men.

Fortunately, my grandmother set aside some money for her old age and death. Our family endured emotional, not financial hardship. But each family is different.

A recent USA Today/ABC News/Gallup Poll found that 41 percent of boomers with a living parent are primary caregivers.

Eight percent of those polled had a parent living in the home, compared to 12 percent who had a parent in a long-term care facility.

Of the 59 percent who aren't currently caring for a parent, half of them worried whether they would be able to when called upon.

Caring for your aging parents seems fair. It's the least you could do for those who changed your diaper and wiped your nose. Now the tables have turned.

But many adult children have elderly ailments, too, and aren't able to do the heavy lifting that comes with elderly care. Some adult children and elderly parents could qualify for similar nursing home care.

Not everyone who wants to care for an aged parent realistically can. Imagine a son who suffered a stroke and refuses to put dear old dad in the care of strangers. Or the diabetic daughter on disability who would rather go into debt than send mom away. Who could blame them? Some states do a better job inspecting hog farms than nursing homes.

Businesses get tax breaks, so why not tax breaks for working families whose breadwinners take early retirement to go into the business of caring for elders? Medicare can be a cruel joke played on families with an elder who has Alzheimer's.

The graying of America brings physical, emotional and financial hardships. There's a Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA), but why no investment in a Cost of Dying Adjustment (CODA)? States should be more vigilant about seeing whether consumers are getting a fair deal or being ripped off by health providers and the funeral industry.

Why no funding for the Lifespan Respite Care law so that adult children can go back to work knowing the government pays for elder day care?

It's summer time, and the living ain't easy — and the dying is priceless.

Rhonda Chriss Lokeman (lokeman@kcstar.com) is a columnist for the Kansas City Star. To find out more about Rhonda Chriss Lokeman, and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.

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