The American Jobs Act Helps our Veterans

A “Returning Heroes” Hiring Tax credit for Veterans Provides Tax Credits from $5,600 to $9,600 to Encourage the Hiring of Unemployed Veterans

This past week President Obama made his jobs speech to the full U.S. Congress. He proposed the American Jobs Act. Within the American Jobs Act, it offers tax credits for Employers who hire U.S. Veterans. More, it helps active military personnel with improved transition services and accrediations.

When Navy Corpsman Joseph Kidd deployed to Iraq in 2007, he had already received a total of 24 months of medical training, and he was combat ready. But he quickly learned that his medical skills-good enough to qualify him to save lives on the front lines-weren’t recognized in the emergency room of his local hospital in Minnesota.

Now Joseph is married with a young child and is heading back to school on the GI Bill. That’s great. Even better would be if he could earn money serving in the health care industry, fully credentialed as a nurse or physicians assistant and ready to go, in a market that eagerly needs more trained personnel.

The Presidential Call for a Career-Ready Military: The Departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs, working closely with other agencies and the President’s economic and domestic policy teams, will lead a new task force to develop reforms to ensure that every member of the service receives the training, education, and credentials they need to transition to the civilian workforce or to pursue higher education. Under President Obama’s proposal, Joseph would have had the opportunity to receive his medical accreditations before he separated from the Navy. Like Joseph, many of our Veterans have the skills, talent, training, and experience to contribute to hospitals, factories, laboratories, and schools the day they put on civilian clothes.



They need a transition process that recognizes the value of their military experience in civilian terms and, when relevant, helps them get the right certifications for their next job. Finally, with the tax credit incentive to hire, Veterans who seek employment on job boards ie…HireVeterans.com will be able to find great jobs from Employers who are actively seeking their services knowing that the government is backing them up providing amazing and strong incentives to bring them on board. If you would like to find out more about the American Jobs Act, you can watch a special enhanced version of the speech, featuring charts and other relevant information here or click on the Facts Sheet: The American Jobs Act The President addressed a joint session of Congress and presented the American Jobs Act, a comprehensive plan to put America back to work. It was created from a set of ideas supported by both Democrats and Republicans, and it acknowledges that if we are going to restore America’s middle class, we need to rebuild the economy the American way, based on balance, fairness and the same set of rules for everyone from Wall Street to Main Street. W. Scott Gould is the Deputy Secretary of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.

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