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NEW YORK (Alexandra Alper) - Army Officer Donna Bachler hasn't had a regular paycheck since she left active duty four years ago, even though she boasts the kind of skills employers vie for.
Bachler, 30, helped run the U.S. Army's postal service in Kuwait, tackling challenges such as how to crack down on mailed contraband and speeding the flow of mail to troops.
Now back in the United States, she gets by on her husband's salary, which will be cut by more than half when he retires from the military as soon as next year.
"One of the ways I sold (military service) to myself and my parents is 'it looks good on a resume,''' said Bachler, who estimates she has applied for at least 1,000 jobs since 2007. ''Sadly, it doesn't.''
As U.S. military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan wind down, tens of thousands of veterans are flooding the job market at a time when millions of civilians can't find jobs.
In June, unemployment among recent veterans grew to 13.3 percent, more than 4 percentage points higher than the national average.
From 2008 to 2010, that rate rose from 7.3 percent to 11.5 percent, and it's expected to climb further as more troops come home this year -- 10,000 from Afghanistan and, unless Iraq requests some to stay, the remaining 46,000 from that country.
"There is a sense of abandonment,'' said Daniel Nichols, former chief of staff for the Labor Department's Veteran Employment and Training Services (VETS). He is now director of Military to Medicine, which trains veterans and their spouses for jobs in healthcare.
'SERVED MY COUNTRY'
Veterans, he said, think: "I served my country and provided all this, and come back and what do I have now? Maybe a lot of bad memories that I don't want and skills that nobody recognizes.''
With veterans' unemployment rising, President Barack Obama is scheduled Friday in a visit Washington's Navy Yard to announce initiatives to prepare vets for civilian jobs.
In the tight job market, recent veterans say they're passed over for jobs not because they are unqualified, but because they lack required credentials, a formal education or a way to describe their military skills that employers understand.
"I compare myself to civilians I know and I have had leadership opportunities -- making the hard choice -- that I don't see in my civilian counterparts,'' said David Nawrocki, a 30-year-old staff sergeant.
Sadly, this shows that most employers are more talk than action when it comes to putting yellow ribbons and "Support our Troops" signs in their windows.In June, unemployment among recent veterans grew to 13.3 percent, more than 4 percentage points higher than the national average.
U.S. Soldiers Return Home To Labor Market With Few Opportunities
NEW YORK (Alexandra Alper) - Army Officer Donna Bachler hasn't had a regular paycheck since she left active duty four years ago, even though she boasts the kind of skills employers vie for.
Bachler, 30, helped run the U.S. Army's postal service in Kuwait, tackling challenges such as how to crack down on mailed contraband and speeding the flow of mail to troops.
Now back in the United States, she gets by on her husband's salary, which will be cut by more than half when he retires from the military as soon as next year.
"One of the ways I sold (military service) to myself and my parents is 'it looks good on a resume,''' said Bachler, who estimates she has applied for at least 1,000 jobs since 2007. ''Sadly, it doesn't.''
As U.S. military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan wind down, tens of thousands of veterans are flooding the job market at a time when millions of civilians can't find jobs.
In June, unemployment among recent veterans grew to 13.3 percent, more than 4 percentage points higher than the national average.
From 2008 to 2010, that rate rose from 7.3 percent to 11.5 percent, and it's expected to climb further as more troops come home this year -- 10,000 from Afghanistan and, unless Iraq requests some to stay, the remaining 46,000 from that country.
"There is a sense of abandonment,'' said Daniel Nichols, former chief of staff for the Labor Department's Veteran Employment and Training Services (VETS). He is now director of Military to Medicine, which trains veterans and their spouses for jobs in healthcare.
'SERVED MY COUNTRY'
Veterans, he said, think: "I served my country and provided all this, and come back and what do I have now? Maybe a lot of bad memories that I don't want and skills that nobody recognizes.''
With veterans' unemployment rising, President Barack Obama is scheduled Friday in a visit Washington's Navy Yard to announce initiatives to prepare vets for civilian jobs.
In the tight job market, recent veterans say they're passed over for jobs not because they are unqualified, but because they lack required credentials, a formal education or a way to describe their military skills that employers understand.
"I compare myself to civilians I know and I have had leadership opportunities -- making the hard choice -- that I don't see in my civilian counterparts,'' said David Nawrocki, a 30-year-old staff sergeant.
U.S. Soldiers Return Home To Labor Market With Few Opportunities
Please cut down the length of the article due to Copyright, thanks.
Also, puts this into perspective:
Obama seeks tax credits to help veterans get jobs - politics - msnbc.com
Please cut down the length of the article due to Copyright, thanks.
Also, puts this into perspective:
Obama seeks tax credits to help veterans get jobs - politics - msnbc.com
Things he maybe should have thought of 2 1/2 years ago instead of forcing Obamacare on the country.... We'll see what happens........
Please cut down the length of the article due to Copyright, thanks.
Also, puts this into perspective:
Obama seeks tax credits to help veterans get jobs - politics - msnbc.com
Things he maybe should have thought of 2 1/2 years ago instead of forcing Obamacare on the country.... We'll see what happens........
Oh that's right. Trying to help Americans, whose number one cause of bankruptcy is medical bills, is a bad thing. Oh no, Republicans have the better plan, "Fuck 'em and let 'em die quickly". We have to protect insurance companies. Because they don't make anything and only skim money from insurance policies, they need the money. Republican politicians need the money. There's plenty to skim for CEO's and for Republican politicians. Not so much for everyone else. Of course, Republicans don't really care about "everyone else". Look at what they did to our soldiers.
Since Republicans sent those soldiers to Iraq with old and rusty equipment in the first place. And Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. Don't you think they should have some "brilliant plan" to help the soldiers they hurt in so many deep and profound ways?
Oh no, they're Republicans. They don't plan. They have "gut feelings" and "common sense". And what do those "gut feelings" and "common sense" say? "Let the weak Democrats take care of them. Democrats always take care of people who need help. The socialist fools."
When you waste 4,8,12,16,20 years in a nontransferable MOS/NEC and don't get an education, what do you expect? For those that say "What about wars and extended deployments"? I say, I garuntee there were plenty of military personnel who did get an education and learned transferable skills in spite of wars and deployments.
This is why Obama HAS to keep three wars going!
These guys will tolerate unemployment for only so long and then they'll put their years of training to good use!
When you waste 4,8,12,16,20 years in a nontransferable MOS/NEC and don't get an education, what do you expect? For those that say "What about wars and extended deployments"? I say, I garuntee there were plenty of military personnel who did get an education and learned transferable skills in spite of wars and deployments.
When I left Europe for the last time I was running a cellular telephone network that would cover an area half the size of Ohio, I spent just under 2 years back in the states as a Senior instructor at the US Army Signal School. With that background and 93 college credit hours I could not find a position with a telecommunications company. Why? Because I was too old and didn't have an actual degree.
This is why Obama HAS to keep three wars going!
These guys will tolerate unemployment for only so long and then they'll put their years of training to good use!
so you are saying that vets are a threat to the USA?
I worked in telecom for much of my working life.
I lost 3 jobs to Indian workers. 1 to an H1B, and 2 to offshored work in India.
No, I'm saying Obama's United Socialist States of Soviet America is a threat to freedom though not one that is incurable.
Things he maybe should have thought of 2 1/2 years ago instead of forcing Obamacare on the country.... We'll see what happens........
Oh that's right. Trying to help Americans, whose number one cause of bankruptcy is medical bills, is a bad thing. Oh no, Republicans have the better plan, "Fuck 'em and let 'em die quickly". We have to protect insurance companies. Because they don't make anything and only skim money from insurance policies, they need the money. Republican politicians need the money. There's plenty to skim for CEO's and for Republican politicians. Not so much for everyone else. Of course, Republicans don't really care about "everyone else". Look at what they did to our soldiers.
Since Republicans sent those soldiers to Iraq with old and rusty equipment in the first place. And Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. Don't you think they should have some "brilliant plan" to help the soldiers they hurt in so many deep and profound ways?
Oh no, they're Republicans. They don't plan. They have "gut feelings" and "common sense". And what do those "gut feelings" and "common sense" say? "Let the weak Democrats take care of them. Democrats always take care of people who need help. The socialist fools."
Glad to see you're as stupid as ever rdean. keep up the posts they are so entertaining, If I didn't know you were serious I would laugh.
When you waste 4,8,12,16,20 years in a nontransferable MOS/NEC and don't get an education, what do you expect? For those that say "What about wars and extended deployments"? I say, I garuntee there were plenty of military personnel who did get an education and learned transferable skills in spite of wars and deployments.
When I left Europe for the last time I was running a cellular telephone network that would cover an area half the size of Ohio, I spent just under 2 years back in the states as a Senior instructor at the US Army Signal School. With that background and 93 college credit hours I could not find a position with a telecommunications company. Why? Because I was too old and didn't have an actual degree.
Oh that's right. Trying to help Americans, whose number one cause of bankruptcy is medical bills, is a bad thing. Oh no, Republicans have the better plan, "Fuck 'em and let 'em die quickly". We have to protect insurance companies. Because they don't make anything and only skim money from insurance policies, they need the money. Republican politicians need the money. There's plenty to skim for CEO's and for Republican politicians. Not so much for everyone else. Of course, Republicans don't really care about "everyone else". Look at what they did to our soldiers.
Since Republicans sent those soldiers to Iraq with old and rusty equipment in the first place. And Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. Don't you think they should have some "brilliant plan" to help the soldiers they hurt in so many deep and profound ways?
Oh no, they're Republicans. They don't plan. They have "gut feelings" and "common sense". And what do those "gut feelings" and "common sense" say? "Let the weak Democrats take care of them. Democrats always take care of people who need help. The socialist fools."
Glad to see you're as stupid as ever rdean. keep up the posts they are so entertaining, If I didn't know you were serious I would laugh.
Once again you couldn't really disagree.
Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. Republicans sent our soldiers there with old and rusty equipment. In fact, they were even ordered to stop welding scrap metal to vehicles that were unprepared for roadside bombs. Then those no bid contracts where Cheney's friends built housing with such poor electricity that solders were electrocuted. Then you have the billions that simply "disappeared" and that awful Blackwater, whose cowboy ways cost who knows how many soldiers lives. Blackwater became a billion dollar company with an entire army.
These are the facts. This is what happened.
More than 30 thousand troops wounded, up to 6,000 of those with brain and spinal injuries and thousands dead, families without fathers and mothers. This is the Republican legacy they insist is now Obama's.
Shepherd Center, located in Atlanta, Georgia, is a private, not-for-profit hospital specializing in medical treatment, research and rehabilitation for people with spinal cord injury and brain injury.
About Shepherd Center - Shepherd Center
The largest such organization in the US puts the cost of someone with this type of injury at over a million for someone 55 and for someone 25, over 3 million.
Times 3 million by 6,000. What do you get? This is the legacy Republicans left this country with they now want to blame on Obama. And look at this, a Republican Medical Doctor wants to cut medical care for soldiers. And I'm being called names? I simply don't understand at what point in time so may Republicans have been replaced with Pod People. Unfeeling and uncaring Pod People.
No shit Sherlock? When did I or anyone else on this board say that they did? In fact tell us when President Bush said that they did....Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11.
Really? Republicans were the only people that voted for military action in Iraq? Are you certain of that? And rusty old equipment? Where did you get this from? Do you know that the majority of the militarys time in peace time is spent in maintaining their equipment so that it is ready for war? Of course you don't know that because you've never been closer to the real deal than a John Wayne movie.Republicans sent our soldiers there with old and rusty equipment.
Probably true, we were unprepared for the IED war. The vehicles were not built for the purposes we found ourselves needing them for. What you do not know is that the Hummer was never designed to be an armored vehicle, Adding the scraps to it hindered it's movements. So the military halted the piecemeal and had professionals redesign the vehicles. BTW, did you know that we used to place sandbags on the floor of our Jeeps (forerunner of the hummer) to protect us from mines (forerunner of IEDs)In fact, they were even ordered to stop welding scrap metal to vehicles that were unprepared for roadside bombs.
Would that be the same no bid contracts to the same companies that President Clintons administration awarded? Yes I think they may be, In fact i do believe the current administration is still awarding them to the same companies.Then those no bid contracts where Cheney's friends built housing with such poor electricity that solders were electrocuted.
