Senator Webb often describes his first piece of legislation as returning the War Time GI-Bill benefits to our military personnel, by returning to the original post World War II version of the bill. This has a lot of appeal especially to OIF veterans like me who will qualify for the benefits. That said, the nature of our service personnel has changed enormously since 1945 and I think that the Webb-GI Bill needs to reflect those changes too. The average solider in WWII was young, single, under-educated, and many of them were draftees. In the 21st Century many of our service personnel are older, married, well educated (90%+ with High School diplomas or better) and we are all volunteers.
So what new innovations do we see in the Webb-GI bill to reflect those changes? ....
The only one I discovered upon review of the bill (thanks Lowell) is the extension of the use-period from 10 years to 15 years. A good idea I'm sure but I think we can do better than that. The bill is still in committee so your senators and congressmen have the opportunity to amend it. Do any of you guys out there have any suggestions? I suspect that the Webb team would be willing to hear from you, especially you older veterans who were covered by the original GI-Bill. This is a great lessons-learned opportunity to improve the bill.
The concept behind the bill is that: 1. It is a reward to the military personnel for their service, especially during wartime. 2. It pays for itself over time due to the increase in taxes paid by the beneficiaries whose higher education leads to better paying jobs. 3. It is a recruiting tool for attracting sharp men and women to the military, who might not otherwise have the resources to attend college.
The only down-side I can see to it is that it also encourages many of those military personnel to leave the service after one tour, so they can go to school and start their way down the road to the American dream. We have been using re-enlistment bonuses and other incentives for years to keep our folks in the military, but now the GI-bill benefit may give them a similar incentive to leave. This is one place where I think we need a new innovation.
What I propose is this: Give the qualified veteran the option to transfer all or part of his benefit to his/her spouse or children. The cost to the taxpayers remains the same but the repayment rate will be much higher and military personnel who might wish to stay on active duty will still do so. Many spouses who sacrifice their own careers to support their military spouse can now share in the benefits (at the discretion of the qualified veteran). Veterans who are not motivated to go to school, but have college age children will now have an opportunity to fund their education instead of his/her own at government expense, allowing him/her to spend his resources in other tax-generating ways.
At age 50+ I could go to law school or something, but I'd much rather use my Webb-GI Bill benefit to fund my son or daughter's education and use their college fund for something else....maybe I could open a brewery, since as we all know...It's all about the beer.
I look forward to hearing your ideas and comments.
it would be a tremendous help to disabled vets and their families. i expect that many spouses of the severly wounded need to increase their earning capacity.