Veterans day should be every day

With military servicemen and women on the forefront of our thoughts this past Veterans Day, we are presented with a chance to reflect on the unfortunate issues and concerns facing veterans every day.

Across the nation, Americans honored veterans by taking special notice of those who dedicate their lives to serving their country. Even the University of Cincinnati hosted a ceremony paying tribute to our nations’ veterans.

But perhaps the best way to pay tribute to the troops is to take a closer look at the very real problems veterans combat once their active-duty service is over and how their quality of life is affected.

One unfortunate reality is a growing number of veterans face the real threat of increased homelessness, as more veterans are turning up homeless quicker than veterans of previous conflicts have.

Veterans make up about one-third of the adult homeless population according to a report by Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. The IAVA report also contends in 2007 nearly 154,000 veterans were homeless on any given night with nearly 300,000 veterans experiencing homelessness at some point during the course of the year.

Some veterans are struggling to adapt to life outside of active duty and have a hard time landing a job and keeping up the necessary funds to pay for expenses. Veterans often face employment discrimination by skeptical civilian employers because of the worry about the condition of a veterans’ mental health and other psychological injuries caused under the stresses of military life.

Returning veterans, faced with the often-difficult transition to civilian life, are also suffering the effects of the tumbling economy as hundreds of thousands of new veterans are faced with an uncertain economic future. Among veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan-era wars, the unemployment rate was more than 8 percent in 2007, which might be as much as 2 percent higher than the rest of the civilian population, according to the IAVA report.