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Extend & Expand the GI Bill

By VVAW

EXTEND AND EXPAND THE GI BILL! Vets in school cannot get by on the present GI Bill payments. And GI's now in service have to go through the "you contribute and then the government will toss in some bucks" process before they have any GI Bill at all--which means you can lose your money if you get a job and decide not to go to school, or means you will have nothing if, after getting out, you decide that school is for you after not contributing to the plan while in the military.

The spokesmen for the government make a big thing of the percentage of vets from the Vietnam era who have sued the GI Bill--72%, they say. What they don't say is that 60% of these used less than 13 months. 3.1 million vets used less than 7 months in part because of screw-ups in payments, late checks, no checks or straight-out inability to get by on checks even when they were accurate.

And vets not only need payments we can live on; we have to be able to use the Bill when we want to, not when the government decides it would be nice. Get rid of the 10-year limit and make the Bill reflect reality--it costs more to live these days. We're already getting over 200% less (in terms of buying power) that World War II vets. We need the education and we have to be able to live while we're getting it.

EXTEND AND EXPAND THE GI BILL!