Veterans sacrificed their time, safety and sanity to serve with the military, but face numerous challenges when they return home – one of which is a lack of understanding among civilians about their serving abroad. Hundreds of thousands of veterans are returning to the private sector as the U.S. downsizes its armed forces, so here are some top numbers to help better know the ones who served this Veterans Day.

How Many Veterans Are There?



There are 21.8 million veterans of the U.S. armed forces as of 2014, according the Census Bureau, approximately 10 percent of whom are women. To put that in context there are 319.2 million Americans, according to the bureau. The states with the highest number of veteran residents are California with 2 million, Texas with 1.6 million and Florida also with 1. 6 million, the bureau estimates. Each of these states have major military bases including Fort Hood in Texas, Fort Irwin in California and Naval Air Station Pensacola.



Courtesy of the U.S. Census Bureau.

Vietnam and World War II:



The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan tested the resolve of a generation with multiple deployments to those nations during the global war on terror since 2001. An estimated 2.5 million service members served in those wars, according to the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America advocacy group, but they represent only a fraction of American veterans. Approximately 7,391,000 service members are still alive from serving during the Vietnam War era between 1964 and 1975, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs. The agency estimates that only 1.71 million Americans are alive today who served during World War II between 1941 and 1945. Elderly veterans place a heavy responsibility on the VA to provide for their health, welfare and employment needs.



Health Care and PTSD:



The Department of Veterans Affairs offers health and welfare services to veterans but has fallen short in its task of serving the mental and physical needs of generations of former troops. The Obama administration raised the VA budget from $100 billion in 2009 to $163.9 billion for 2014, but some critics including the IAVA advocacy group have said that money is not being efficiently spent to manage the agency’s 150 hospitals and 820 outpatient clinics.

Part of the problem is a growing awareness of – and lack of counseling for – mental problems like post-traumatic stress disorder that can haunt a soldier for years afterward with bad memories of extreme violence or other scarring memories of serving abroad, sometimes on multiple tours. Up to 20 percent of troops who served in Iraq or Afghanistan since 2001 have come home reporting PTSD, according to the VA. That number may grow as it can take years for a veteran to report PTSD to a counselor or even become troubled by bad memories.

Veterans' Education:



High school is highest level of formal education for many U.S. veterans, in part because they can join the military at 18 and sacrifice the college years that middle-class Americans sometimes take for granted. Years later when they return to civilian life the age difference with younger college students can make integration difficult, and some merely want to get a job and make money. As a result, 92 percent of veterans the age of 25 or older have a high school diploma, while only 26 percent of veterans in that age range have a bachelor’s degree, according to the Census Bureau. Online college courses are being offered to veterans to help combat this education deficit.

Veteran Small Business:



Leadership skills and discipline gained in the military make troops more likely than civilians to become entrepreneurs or small business owners. Veterans accounted for 9.1 percent of U.S. business owners in 2012, which shrank from 10.7 percent in 2008, according to the Small Business Administration. That’s a pretty high rate considering that only about 9 percent of U.S. adults are veterans. The shrinking rate may be due to the aging and retirement of the veteran population.

Veteran Employment:





Health problems and lack of nonmilitary job training can make finding a job after leaving the armed forces difficult despite partnerships between companies to hire veterans. There were 722,000 unemployed veterans in 2013, 60 percent of whom were older than age 45, while 35 percent were between the age of 25 to 44, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Veterans of past service eras may have a lower unemployment rate because retirement and health disability are lowering their labor participation rate. The jobless rate for veterans of all ages as of October was 4.5 percent, compared with the 5.8 percent for the overall civilian population.



White House Council of Economic Advisers

Veteran Homelessness:



Because of a lack of affordable health treatment and job prospects, veterans represent about 12 percent of America’s homeless population, and approximately 50,000 veterans are homeless each night, according to the Department of Housing and Urban Development. The number of homeless veterans has declined by 33 percent since the depths of the recession in 2010 in part because of treatment and welfare efforts, the department reports.

Was It Worth It?