Returning Home from Iraq and Afghanistan Assessment of Readjustment Needs of Veterans, Service Members, and Their Families (2013) / Chapter Skim
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8 Socioeconomic Impacts of Deployment on Service Members and Spouses
8 Socioeconomic Impacts of Deployment on Service Members and Spouses
Pages 387-412
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From page 387... ...
Spouses of veterans face similar issues and impacts, about which less is known. To examine socioeconomic impacts, the committee sought to measure the impact of deployment to OEF, OIF, and OND on several outcomes: veterans' civilian employment if separated from the military; service members' earnings and other income both during and following service; their household wealth and finances; their acquired education and access to further education; the incidence of homelessness among separated veterans; the incidence of criminal behavior; and spousal employment, earnings, and education.
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From page 388... ...
In the following sections, the committee first presents its assessments of the social and economic impacts of deployment on individual service members. Second, the committee discusses socioeconomic impacts of deployment on military spouses and speculates about the impacts on spouses of veterans.
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From page 389... ...
The committee found little research that had explicitly examined the impact of deployment to these recent wars on educational attainment, wealth, homelessness, or crime, but this chapter presents some related findings that are related and plausibly relevant. For example, earlier research has suggested that veterans may obtain education that is less valuable than that obtained by nonveterans.
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From page 390... ...
received callbacks while black combat veterans did not receive any callbacks, a statistically significant difference that may represent biased perceptions. Combat-related trauma such as PTSD appears to affect employability and/or productivity, and some research suggests there may have been differential effects of combat exposure by race in the Vietnam era (Rohlfs, 2010)
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From page 391... ...
Part of the observed differences in employment rates may be driven by basic demographic differences between veterans and nonveterans beyond age and sex, such as educational attainment and race or ethnicity. After controlling for all demographic differences and other compositional factors in the CPS data, Kleykamp (2012)
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From page 392... ...
Household income would also include any lost earnings replaced by disability benefits, making it difficult to tell what might have happened to earnings as a result of deployment-related mental or physical trauma. But the 2010 NSV data indicates lower VA disability among post9/11 veterans who deployed to OEF and/or OIF, or essentially a healthy warrior effect.
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From page 393... ...
Educational and Vocational Needs Veterans who served during the OEF and OIF period might have greater educational attainment than they might otherwise because of the educational benefits that are available to veterans under the different forms of the GI Bill. Until September 2009, such veterans could draw on funding from the Montgomery GI Bill.
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From page 394... ...
The 2010 NSV asked about educational attainment and use of VA educational benefits, including among deployed and nondeployed veterans of the post-9/11 era. Edwards (2012)
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From page 395... ...
To combat predatory lending practices targeting military families short on liquidity, the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2007 implemented new regulations on payday loans made to active duty service members and their families. The committee is aware of few subsequent studies of the financial well-being of military families or of veterans who deployed to OEF, OIF, and/or OND.
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From page 396... ...
While the committee is not aware of any studies associating OEF and/or OIF combat exposure with criminal behavior, Egendorf et al.
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From page 397... ...
Altogether, the limited evidence from the 2010 NSV suggests that overseas deployment increases combat exposure, which has had lifelong impacts on socioeconomic wellbeing among older cohorts of war veterans. Whether and how today's war veterans might differ from earlier cohorts in their resilience are important questions that may be unanswerable until later in their life cycles.
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From page 398... ...
The causal effects of deployment on those outcomes may be substantially different. THE COSTS OF WAR-RELATED INJURIES PAID BY GOVERNMENTS AND INDIVIDUALS Like medical treatment costs associated with war-related injuries, socioeconomic impacts of injuries or deployment such as those considered in this chapter can also be conceptualized as costs.
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From page 399... ...
In this section, the committee first reviews the literature on total budgetary costs, or the spending by the VA on disability benefits and health care for injured veterans of OEF, OIF, and OND. Then it explores the broader literature on costs of treatment before examining studies of the full costs of injuries and the cost effectiveness of various treatment interventions.
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From page 400... ...
Trends in average treatment costs offered no clear evidence about the intensity of treatments. When measured over the entire veteran cohort, which includes those who remain in treatment and those who leave treatment, average treatment costs typically fell over time because patients left treatment, lowering the numerator (costs)
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From page 401... ...
Relatively few studies report actual cost estimates rather than offering commentary or discussing costs in a general sense. Among those that estimate costs, most typically consider treatment costs only and do not assess effects of injuries or treatments on quality of life, productivity, or other secondary outcomes.
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From page 402... ...
They measure the total costs over 2 years of mental health trauma associated with PTSD and major depression, including treatment costs, lost earnings, reductions in quality of life, and the value of lives lost to potential suicides. By estimating changes in the total costs across changes in treatment regimen, these studies also inform the optimal choice of treatments.
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From page 403... ...
But VHA treatment costs rise. Still, the net effect of this change in policy could be to reduce total VA spending if disability benefits were reduced by the amount of the gained productivity, $3,320, which exceeds the increase in VHA treatment costs.
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From page 404... ...
Academic researchers and the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office now tend to agree on short- and medium-term forecasts of budgetary costs associated with medical treatment. If past trends continue, these costs will continue to rise over the remaining lifetimes of OEF and OIF veterans and present a clear motivation for long-term planning.
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From page 405... ...
The committee believes there are several clear policy implications regarding the lifelong costs associated with deployment-related mental health trauma, such as major depression and PTSD, and TBI. Studies suggest that expanding evidence-based treatment regimens for those disorders, which emphasize more frequent use of psychotherapy and pharmacologic interventions, might increase short-term treatment costs but would strongly reduce the broader costs paid by governments and individuals by improving outcomes.
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From page 406... ...
Much statistical evidence cannot support rejection of the hypothesis that there is no effect of deployment on the average service member, nor can it strongly support accepting that the precise effect is zero. But given current patterns connecting overseas deployment with combat exposure, and past patterns of need among older cohorts of war veterans, the committee believes that socioeconomic impacts of deployment may reveal themselves later in the life cycles of today's service members returning from overseas deployments.
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From page 407... ...
To assess the causal impact of deployment on these outcomes, instrumental variables or other approaches should be used. Research on previous generations of veterans identified important gains in educational attainment resulting from military educational benefits like the GI Bill.
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From page 408... ...
Further study might focus on whether employment tax credits are a cost-effective means of expanding employment for Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom veterans and whether programs to counsel and prepare service members for long-term postservice careers are effectively implemented. The Post-9/11 GI Bill is one of the largest expansions of educational subsidies to veterans and their families on record, but its effectiveness is difficult to gauge.
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From page 409... ...
2012. The Veterans Health Administration's Treatment of PTSD and Traumatic Brain Injury Among Recent Combat Veterans.
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From page 410... ...
2012. Overseas deployment, combat exposure, and well-being in the 2010 National Survey of Veterans.
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From page 411... ...
2009. Resource utilization and disability outcome assessment of combat casualties from Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom.
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From page 412... ...
Santa Monica: RAND Corporation.
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