by T.P. Crump
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by T.P. Crump
This past week, Americans across the nation joined residents of Daviess County in celebrating Veterans’ Day on Nov. 11. This holiday was originally called Armistice Day to celebrate the end of World War I, the war fought to end all wars. More Americans have served in the armed forces since the first Armistice day than had fought in all the nation’s wars before that time.
In 1954, the Armistice Day holiday was changed to Veterans’ Day. This specific national holiday has been set aside to honor the men and women who have served in their country’s armed forces.
There are 812 living veterans in Daviess County. According to the Census Bureau and the Department of Veterans’ Affairs, the number of living veterans in Daviess County had declined from 879 in 1993 or by 7.6%.
There were an estimated 569,045 veterans in Missouri in 2000, the statewide number of veterans having declined by 4.9% from the 598,242 veterans in 1993. Nationally, there were an estimated 25,033,851 veterans in 2000 down by 6.1% from 26,654,677 veterans in 1993. The Department of Veterans Affairs projects that both the number of veterans and the proportion of veterans as a part of the total population will continue to decline for the foreseeable future. It is likely that this trend will also be apparent in Daviess County.
More than 38 million Americans have served in the nation’s armed forces since the Revolutionary War. More than 90.0% of these served during the Twentieth Century. The overwhelming majority of these veterans served their country during wartime.
Benefits for veterans have come to play a larger and larger part of American life. Most of these were mandated in the G.I. Bill of Rights which was enacted for the benefit of veterans returning from World War II. Some are direct cash benefits. Others are indirect such as veterans’ preference additions to test scores for applicants for postal and civil service jobs.
Americans considered it appropriate to provide compensation and benefits for veterans long before the United States became a nation. The first know law providing benefits for veterans was enacted by the Pilgrim colony of Plymouth, Mass., in 1636. It provided that any man sent forth as a soldier in the colony’s war against the Pequot Indians, if maimed, was to be maintained at the colony’s expense for the rest of his life.
According to the Department of Veterans Affairs, the federal government spent slightly less then $39.1 billion for direct veteran’s benefits during fiscal 2000, the most recent fiscal year for which complete figures are available. This figure does not include any expenditures for veteran loan programs which amounted to slightly less than $7.1 billion during fiscal year 2000.
Today, veterans’ direct benefits fall into four major categories. These include: compensation and pensions, readjustment and vocational rehabilitation expenses, insurance and indemnities, and medical services and administrative costs. The federal government also provides a number of indirect benefits for veterans including various loan guarantee programs and preferential hiring for certain government jobs.
Total veterans’ benefits in Daviess County amounted to $896,135 during fiscal 2000. Local expenditures for benefits per veteran were $1,104 during that year or 66.0% of the Missouri average of $1,671 per veteran.
However, since total Missouri expenditures for veterans include $450,461,683 for medical services and administrative costs and for construction costs for medical facilities, this comparison is not entirely fair. These costs account for 47.4% of all Veterans’ Administration spending in Missouri. Veterans in Daviess County are as eligible for veterans’ medical services as veterans anywhere else in the state.
When veterans from Daviess County do use these services, the costs do not show up in the total spent for veterans’ benefits in Daviess County. Instead, these costs are shown as having been incurred in the county where the services were provided.
An apples to apples comparison of the cost of direct benefits per veteran locally and the statewide average would exclude expenses for medical services. Once that is done, the Missouri per veteran cost for other direct benefits is $879. The local per veteran figure of $1,104 represents 125.6% of this figure.
Expenditures of veterans’ compensation and pensions were $805,647 in Daviess County during fiscal 2000. These accounted for 89.9% of local direct veterans’ benefits during that fiscal year. In Missouri, expenditures for compensation and pensions were $428,282,231 during fiscal 2000 or 45.0% total veterans’ direct benefits.
Readjustment and vocational rehabilitation expenses for veterans in Daviess County were $34,635 during fiscal 2000. This accounted for 3.9% of direct benefits paid to local veterans. In Missouri, readjustment and vocational rehabilitation expenses had amounted to $33,920,144 during fiscal 2000 or 3.6% of total statewide spending for direct veterans’ benefits.
The federal government spent $55,853 in Daviess County for payments for and through veterans’ insurance and indemnity programs. This was 6.2% of the total amount spent for veterans’ benefits locally. In Missouri, these programs spent $38,046,924 which was 4.0% of total spending for direct veterans’ benefits.