<p>I don’t know the details about this family. It was just another poster at another site, and really I brought it up because I had already thought up the strategy and wondered if it were legal. The poster said they had a son with Aspergers, who was unemployed, and sadly in this economy there are a lot of unemployed Aspies.</p>
<p>I’m not an expert on SSI, but I’m pretty sure it’s not that easy to get SSI for an Aspie. The deficits are not always obvious. I have the impression we couldn’t get SSI for my son, for example, although it wouldn’t make sense for us in any case so we haven’t pursued the matter.</p>
<p>Bay, not only would it make sense to structure income in a way to maximize eligibility for benefits, it might be the sort of thing where the manager of a trust would likely have a fiduciary duty to do so.</p>
<p>Are you saying that I can’t hire a dog-walker or a housekeeper unless it produces income to me? (Please hurry with your response: the contractor who has been rebuilding my bathroom keeps asking for more money!)</p>
<p>That’s only if the parents are trying to deduct the salary as a business expense. But it is perfectly legal for me to hire someone as a dog walker to walk my dogs (if I had any dogs). Of course it is. People hire other people to do personal services all the time. </p>
<p>And it is perfectly legal, I say, for me to hire my son to walk my dogs (if I had any dogs), provided I pay payroll taxes and keep all the required records.</p>
<p>I am talking about the law that applies to hiring relatives. It doesn’t apply to strangers. The law is more stringent when it comes to hiring relatives. You can still pay them but it won’t be counted as earned income unless it meets the criterior set above. Otherwise, we could all pay our kids $6,000 and have them open a roth account on day i.</p>
<p>CF, It is to qualify as earned income regardless of deductions.</p>
<p>I looked at 26 USC § 267 - Losses, expenses, and interest with respect to transactions between related taxpayers and can’t see how it applies to the present situation.</p>
<p>The kid is in a non-Medicaid state and (I assume) doesn’t qualify as disabled. Or let’s say the kid is in a non-Medicaid state and doesn’t qualify as disabled by hypothesis, so we can talk about this hypothetical.</p>
<p>Question: I know that if your employer health insurance is more than 9.5% of your income (and you’re between 100% and 400% of FPL), you qualify for a subsidy. However, I thought someone mentioned a sliding scale. If so, can someone explain that or link me to an explanation? (I’m very tired right now so I might be completely off-base and confusing two issues.)</p>
<p>I think that when ACA was conceived to to be built around the tax system, that Congress would have anticipated that people would structure income and expenditures to benefit from the law. That is inherent in the nature of tax penalties and credits – people do it all the time, and the penalties/credits are intended to incentivize certain behaviors. (Think of the home mortgage deduction as an example). </p>
<p>That doesn’t mean that Congress wants people to quit their jobs to reduce their income to qualify for subsidies – but they probably also felt that the 400% FPL limit was a low enough ceiling to discourage wealthier people from playing games. (I mean, there is also a powerful disincentive that goes along with reduced income and corresponding impact on lifestyle).</p>
<p>Of course, wealthy people with a lot of assets have many other ways that they can structure and shelter income to yield much larger tax savings than the amounts available via insurance subsidies.</p>
<p>^ Igloo, but under what circumstances? You can certainly hire relatives. What can you cite? I think you need to clarify when it needs to be income-producing.</p>
<p>You’re right that just buying the insurance for the kid probably would be more cost effective, dstark. But maybe not. Subsidized people also get subsidies for co-pays. This kid supposedly had high prescription drug costs. Maybe if you costed it all out, the family would come out ahead hiring the kid.</p>
<p>Anyway it’s just a hypothetical. </p>
<p>In reality-land, shouldn’t preironic in #7904 be structuring their income to qualify for subsidies?</p>
<p>Romani, if your employer insurance premium is more than 9.5% of your income, you qualify for subsidies on the exchange just the same as if you didn’t have any employer insurance.</p>
<p>preironic, I have been successful in signing up through healthcare.gov. </p>
<p>I was one of those that got stuck in identity verification purgatory. </p>
<p>My mom, too, was just successful in signing up. Unfortunately, she is one of those stuck in the < 100% of FPL loophole so she has to pay full price (for the cheapest plan, it’s $310/month for her age) until Medicaid kicks in in April for her.</p>
<p>This is for my fiance. His insurance ends up being about 8% of his income and he is currently making ~20000/year. I thought he didn’t qualify for subsidies because it is under 9.5% but it turns out he might.</p>
<p>LF, I already gave two examples. They are in the last page. It’s not that hard to understand.</p>
<p>calmom, I’d think Congress could have just stuck to the old standard in excluding assets; exclude some assets like retirement savings and home equity. Instead they expanded the exclusion; no assets will be considered in determining aids.</p>