FICA is the tax one pays that goes into Medicare while they are employed. You need to pay FICA taxes for at least 20 years to qualify for Medicare. Medicare doesn’t cover long term care, and it doesn’t cover care givers. Medicaid has a long term care benefit that greatly offsets the cost of a nursing home with a share of cost. Medicaid also has IHSS which covers a certain number of caregiver hours, that said, you need to make below a certain threshold to qualify for Medicaid.