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A new bill could streamline the process for making sure disabled veterans receive their yearly COLA increase.
Every year veterans play a waiting game to see if they’ll receive a cost-of-living adjustment (COLA).
Congress has never failed to pass legislation to grant these increases. But keeping the adjustment in legislative limbo each year continues to rile veterans groups and some elected officials.
“Congress has routinely provided this increase, but it is an added step that confuses and leaves veterans feeling uneasy until the COLA bill is passed,” Raymond Kelly, director of Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW), said in a statement to the Veterans’ Affairs Subcommittee.
A New Jersey Congressman recently introduced legislation that would end the waiting game through automatic COLA increases. It’s the latest attempt to give veterans greater peace of mind when it comes to these increasingly important adjustments.
Sponsored by Republican U.S. Rep. Jon Runyan, the American Heroes’ COLA Act allows increases in the rates of veterans’ disability compensation and survivor benefits to be made automatically each year.
Under the current law, increases in COLA for veterans’ disability and survivor benefits are dependent on a bill being passed annually by Congress. The increase traditionally follows the Consumer Price Index (CPI), a measure of the cost of goods and services kept by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. This is the same increase that is given automatically to programs like Social Security and military retirement.
Veterans “do not deserve to wait and wonder every year if they will receive an increase in their benefits,” Runyan wrote last month in a newsletter for constituents. If passed, the bill would go into effect on Dec 1, 2013.
This isn’t the first push to automate COLA increases. In the past, Congress has rejected similar efforts because there are political benefits to the current system.
First, politicians like to be able to say they voted for a bill that increased benefits for veterans. It also creates the potential for some less favorable legislation to become attached to the bill that either gets passed with the increase or kills the measure altogether.
This is why several major veteran organizations have voiced strong support for this new bill, including the Department of Veterans Affairs.
“It would be consistent with Congress’ long-standing practice of enacting regular cost-of-living increases for compensation and DIC benefits in order to maintain the value of these important benefits, but would eliminate the need for additional legislation to implement such increases in the future,” Thomas Murphy, the VA’s Compensation Service director, told the House Veterans Affairs Committee.
The American Heroes’ COLA Act was recently approved by the House Subcommittee on Disability Assistance and Memorial Affairs and is currently with the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs.
Photo courtesy of cliff1066
15 Comments
POLITICS,POLITICS N MORE POLITICS!!!THEY PLAY WITH OUR LIVES NOW THEY PLAY WITH OUR HEADS!!!!don;t GE t excited hurry up n wait]
Hey all you fine taxpayers. There are some hypocrites out there who don’t think I should be talking about how I would spend any raise you give me in my military retirement and VA check. I believe in telling it just like it is. If I get a raise in my military retirement and my VA check I am going to buy a new truck to pull that new boat I bought with last year’s raise. Now remember, the only way I will get that raise is from you taxpayers. So let your congressfolk know what you think about this bill.Just because some don’t want those paying the bill to know what is going on doesn’t mean they don’t deserve to know.I’ll say it again – all you taxpayers need to support this so I can get that new truck to pull my boat.Keep sending those raises and I’ll keep spending them. I love it.
I don’t believe u r a veteran but if u r u deserve that truck and the boat. U deserve it if u got injuried serving this country!!!
They are lying, they obviously have no clue what’s it all about or what it means.
Novuslivy- if you can afford a truck and a boat with your VA check more power to you but me thinks I smell B.S. The average Veteran is struggling to make it on what we get and we respect the American tax payers who give us what we have too much to post ridiculous post like yours. Our love for our country and the American people is why we joined the military to fight for the freedom we have been blessed with, would never let us post some thing like what you posted
What are you talking about??? I’ve never gotten a cola for my Uniformed Serivices Retirement or my service connected disabilities that’s ever been over say even 50 dollars per month. And it comes from the treasury that’s glutted monthly from garnished income from the fruits of war, natural resources and other commodities, such as anything grown, produced, mined or piped. Taxes don’t go up because of our COLA’s as they are not based upon that, but upon glut in the treasury.
Novuslivy<<<<<< What raise did you ever get for service connected disabilities that enabled you to buy a truck or boat?????
I remember going without a COLA increase for 2009 and 2010. ” Congress has never failed to pass legislation to grant these increases” Don’t know where the writer came up with this.
How can they say we always get our COLA,??? We’ve went several years already before Obama got it, Clinton always gave us top dollar, Bush slowly and finally killed it,, Obama got me my first COLA in at least 2-3 years.
How can these articles say we always manage to get one? IS THE MEDIA THAT UNINFORMED? Or are they just outright liars to the general public so that they can argue with us also about this issue?
It’s a big deal to get an annual raise on our service connected disabilities!!!
If they stopped giving it but only every other decade here and there, veterans would soon be behind, homeless and living in shelters again.
This article is typical, just typical!!!!!!!
This is why I pray Obama wins again, just so we get our COLA because I know as soon as a Rebublican gets into office, bam, again we’ll be waiting 4 to 8 years to get a COLA while soldiers fight, die and sacrifice limb and soul so they can keep getting their raises for themselves and HUGE bonus’ for their corporate financiers we fight for!!!!!!!!!! People even those who wave the flag and have a yellow ribbon sticker or “support the troops” banner will argue and say, “we take good care of our veterans and all they do is complain”,,
These are people that never send anyone in their family and argue with anyone wanting to join in their family, and they are against any true support for troops or veterans, they just want to show they do outwardly with banners and stickers. They make me sick! I get so tired of arguing about it. They know nothing of what it is to give up your own freedoms and sign on the dotted line giving life, limb and yes SOUL to the cause of freedom and liberty whether it be just that, or the misconstruction of that ideal by the politicians and their opponents.
A COLA that can help ‘Novuslivy’ buy a new truck to pull the boat he bought with LAST years COLA is an obvious bunch of MALARKEY!! LOL! If I remember right, last year (or the year before), it was the first COLA increase we’d gotten in. 3 years. Do t know for sure what (or if) a 2013 COLA will be, but I’m hearing between 1.7% and 1.9%……..about $50 for mea
Ive heard that they want to lump us in permantly in with social security…that would be a mistake, because if social security dont get a raise in thier cola, then vets wont..we should be writing our leaders to pass the American Heros Act, then we wont have to be wondering if we will get a COLA every year…Id like a Cola with my COLA…..lol
You all should know, all Soc Sec bene’s and VA Disability (retirement, SSI, surviors, VA Disability) are all tied to the Consumer Price Index as published by the fantasy land Bureau of Labor Statistics. but don’t take my word for it…go back and look for yourself! The only time Veterans rec a COLA is the same time Social Security does.
I am a Vet, we went without a COLA increase for 2 years. We give our lives daily and all can see fit is a 1.7 percent raise, not that I’m complaining, cause my good days out weigh my bad ones. But there are vets out here who depend on the one and only check each month to feed themselves, get medicine and put a roof over their heads. I just wish some of them congressmen and people of the senate would just walk a day in our shoes.
Novuslivy, you are an idiot, your sarcasm is no more then a pitiful attempt at getting s**t stirred. Michael Coker was right, there is noway you can be a veteran or you are just plain stupid.
Ketchum Kenneth, That is the big COLA money that we all receive…it’s not much but every little bit helps.