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A G.I. Bill For The 21st Century
In 1944, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the "Servicemen's
Readjustment Act"
-- the original G.I. Bill -- which ultimately allowed more than eight
million combat veterans returning from the battlefields of World War II
to receive full college tuition, low-cost mortgages, and living costs.
Because of this bill, these veterans served as "the
engine of opportunity in the postwar years." Unfortunately, the
program FDR signed into law has since been scaled back, and with
college tuition and fees across the country skyrocketing, G.I.
Bill benefits today fall far short of actual costs. In fact,
"the
most a veteran can receive is approximately $9,600 a year for four
years," which "covers
only 60-70% of the average cost of four years at a public
college or university, or less than two years at a typical private
college." Thus, after surviving combat in Iraq or Afghanistan,
returning veterans are having difficulty surviving the financial
burdens of higher education. Sens. Jim Webb (D-VA) and Chuck Hagel
(R-NE) recently
wrote that today's G.I. Bill is "a reasonable enlistment
incentive for peacetime
service, but it is an insufficient reward for wartime service today."
Indeed, on his first official day in office in January 2007, Webb
introduced Senate Bill 22 -- "a mirror
of the World War II G.I. Bill" -- in an effort to bridge the gap
between today's G.I. benefits and rising tuitions costs. While Webb's
measure has since stalled, a bipartisan Senate coalition
including Webb, Hagel, Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), and Sen. John
Warner
(R-VA) yesterday reintroduced a revised version of S. 22 (H.R.
2707) to advance a "21st
Century G.I. Bill."
NEW G.I. BILL BETTER FOR VETS: The
new
version of the bill "would be available to all members of the
military who have served on active duty since September 11, 2001."
Reservists and National Guard members -- who now get a fraction of
the
benefits available to
active-duty troops -- will also be included in the bill. Eligible
veterans would receive education benefits equaling the highest tuition
rate of the most expensive in-state public college or university and
provide a monthly stipend for housing determined by geographical area.
Beyond that, S. 22 "would create a program in
which the government would provide a dollar-for-dollar match to
contributions from private educational institutions with higher tuition
rates than those covered under the bill." Veterans would also have 15
years to use their educational assistance, compared to 10 years under
the current law. The new G.I. bill "is projected to
cost about $2.5
billion per year," roughly the cost of U.S. operations in Iraq
for one week.
MONEY FOR WAR, NOT VETERANS: In last month's State of
the Union address, President Bush proposed
expanding the transferability of "unused education benefits to
their spouses or children," but the budget he submitted to Congress a
week later "included
no funding for such an initiative." Moreover, the White House and
the Pentagon have so far shown resistance to Webb's bill "out of
fear that too
many will use it." Robert Clarke, assistant director of accessions
policy at the Department of Defense, said "the incentive to serve and
leave" may "outweigh the incentive to have them stay." According to
Clarke, "it is simply off-base to compare what was
offered to World War II veterans to the situation today. There was no
concern about retention rates back then." In testimony
to Congress last summer, other Defense Department officials said
that "the current
program for active duty is
basically sound and serves its purpose in support of the all-volunteer
force. The department finds no need for the kind of sweeping (and
expensive) changes offered." Giacomo Mordente III, former
president of the National Association of Veterans' Program
Administrators, said: "The administration always has
an unlimited
budget to go to war. But when it comes time to help the people, the
casualties of the war, they do whatever they can to limit liability."
NEW G.I. BILL IS A BETTER RECRUITMENT
TOOL: The Boston Globe noted
that the "promise of an education in return for serving the country is
one
of the most frequently cited reasons that young men and women join the
military." However, "[t]he limited return on the promise is one
of the most common sources of bitterness and frustration that emerge in
interviews with Iraq and Afghanistan veterans." One returning
Iraq veteran cited recruitment ads saying: "Don't worry. College is
taken care of." Yet the veteran quickly added, "[I]t is not true."
Patrick
Campbell of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of American (IAVA) said the
$20,000, $30,000, even $40,000 enlistment bonus checks are "not a good
investment." The IAVA says the new G.I. Bill "is a practical
answer to the military's
troop shortage" and that "[r]ather than continuing to spend billions in
bonuses
for lower-standard enlistees, increasing G.I. Bill benefits
would encourage high-aptitude young people to join the
military." Indeed, the
veterans organization cited "a 1988 Congressional study show[ing]
that every dollar spent
on educational benefits under the original GI Bill added seven dollars
to
the national economy in terms of productivity, consumer spending and
tax
revenue."
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"After weeks of rancorous negotiations to resolve a postelection conflict that killed nearly 1,500 people, Kenya's two rival parties signed an agreement on power-sharing Thursday."
CALIFORNIA:
State sues U.S. Forest Service "over plans that would open more than
500,000 acres to roads and oil drilling in the state's largest national
forests."
TEXAS:
State is on pace for record voter turnout.
MISSOURI:
State House "passed legislation that would place restrictions on who
can gather signatures for petitions on ballot initiatives."
THINK
PROGRESS: White House smears Nobel economist: "lacks courage" for
ignoring the "cost of failure" in Iraq.
DEMOCRACY
ARSENAL: Worrying signs of increasing sectarian tensions in Iraq.
VET
VOICE: New documents reveal corrupt defense contractor was more
concerned with public relations than troop safety.
CROOKS
AND LIARS: MSNBC's Dan Abrams catches Rep. Jack Kingston (R-GA) in
a
blatant moment of hypocrisy.
