February 2011 Navy
By CAPT Tom McAtee
VA URGES VETERANS TO SIGN UP FOR DIRECT DEPOSITS
The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) urges Veterans to sign up for electronic payment of their benefits.
On 1 March 2013, the VA will stop issuing paper checks. Veterans who do not have electronic payments for their federal benefits will receive their funds via a prepaid debit card called the Direct Express card. Anyone already receiving federal benefit payments electronically will be unaffected by the changes. To learn more about the federal government’s switch to direct deposit or to change VA benefits to direct deposit, visit www.GoDirect.org. Information about the federal government’s “Go Direct” campaign is also available at 1-800-333-1795. Note that along with payments for VA benefits, the change will also affect recipients of payments from Social Security, Supplemental Security Income, Railroad Retirement Board, or Office of Personnel Management.
HISTORICAL LOOK AT VETERAN BENEFITS
Mr. Bernard Rostker, former Undersecretary of Defense for Personnel and now a Senior Fellow at the RAND Corp., has been researching what will be a two-volume study on the treatment of veterans and their survivors, going back to before the Revolutionary War, with a special focus on wounded warrior care. His original working premise was that veterans’ care and benefits today reflect a deeper attachment to the force, the result of moving away from a military of conscripts, after the Vietnam War, to a more professional force comprised entirely of volunteers. However, as the study continued, he found the working premise to be wrong. Much of what’s being done today for veterans of the all-volunteer force is “rediscovering” what’s been done before.
One glaring exception, he said, is the focus today on treating mental wounds of war, post-traumatic stress disorder. Resources aimed at the invisible wounds are unprecedented. Other patterns emerge such as government support tends to deepen with budget surpluses, and benefits tend to improve as veterans age, their ranks thin out, and enhancements become more affordable. Wars bring change, too. The Department of Veterans Affairs budget has more than doubled since U.S. troops invaded Afghanistan in October 2001––from $51 billion then to $114 billion in the fiscal year that ended 30 Sept. 2010. VA spending is set to climb another ten percent this year, to $125 billion. President Franklin Roosevelt made a misstep while trying to pull the nation out of the Great Depression. At his urging, Congress, in 1933, passed the Economy Act, which cut deeply into veterans’ benefits. Roosevelt told the American Legion convention “the mere wearing of a uniform” in war should not entitle a veteran, and later his survivors, to a pension for disabilities incurred after he left service.
The backlash was strong enough that the following March Congress had enough votes to override Roosevelt’s veto and restore almost all of the benefits it had cut a year earlier. The Continental Congress, in 1776, first recognized responsibility for wounded veterans, voting to authorize half pay for life to anyone who lost a limb or their ability to earn a living due to the revolution. By 1805, Congress approved pay for disabilities developed years after a veteran left service. By 1818, with federal coffers flush with tariff money, the Department of War gave pensions to anyone who served in wartime, not just the disabled. In 1836, Congress extended pension eligibility to widows and children of Revolutionary War veterans, adding enormously to the cost.
The Civil War Pension Law of 1862 was viewed as the most generous any government had ever adopted, allowing disability payments for injuries or ailments incurred as a direct result of service. It even set up a medical screening system, though the reliance on hometown doctors led to rampant fraud. Through history, Rostker said, you see the generosity in many ways, in the amount of money given, and in the change of eligibility standards.
GI BILL IMPROVEMENTS PASSED BY CONGRESS
Known as “GI Bill 2.0,” the legislation is a compromise among veterans groups, schools and the Veterans Affairs Department to upgrade and fix problems with the year-old Post-9/11 GI Bill. Congress resurrected and passed a pack- age of improvements in the Post-9/11 GI Bill that includes book allowances for active-duty members, living stipends for distance-learning students and coverage for vocational and apprenticeship classes.
To save on costs, the bill makes VA the last payer to a school, because scholarships, fee waivers and other student aid will be applied before GI Bill benefits are used. This change, effective in August, saves the government money but could prevent veterans from pocketing money, as some can today.