Unemployment rate higher for veterans than for non-veterans
BY FRANCINE KNOWLES Business Reporter/fknowles@suntimes.com May 29, 2011 6:42PM
Kevin Winkfield Jr., who served as a medic in Iraq and who has a bachelor’s degree in communications is trying to stay positive even though he is unemployed. | Brian Jackson~Sun-Times
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Updated: September 10, 2011 12:36AM
Army veteran Kevin Winkfield Jr. served as a combat medic helping save lives in Iraq, earned a bachelor’s degree in mass communications after his discharge and has diverse skills that he believes would benefit many employers. But this Memorial Day, just like last year, the 29-year-old Chicago resident is unemployed.
He’s not alone. In the midst of a continuing weak job market, the unemployment rate for Gulf War era II veterans, those who’ve served since September 2001, averaged 11.5 percent last year. That compares to 9.4 percent for non-veterans, according to the Labor Department. Veterans ages 18 to 24 fared even worse — more than one in five were unemployed.
There hasn’t been much improvement this year. In April, Gulf War era II veterans had a 10.9 percent unemployment rate, compared to 8.5 percent for non-veterans.
“It’s been difficult,” said Winkfield, who has applied for media production and health care jobs. “I haven’t gotten any response even though I have the experience.”
Winkfield is frustrated that so many veterans like himself are jobless given their skills, experience and other intangibles.
“Leadership, loyalty, duty, respect,” he said, citing attributes veterans were taught along with occupational skills. “You’re talking about a person who’s willing to put their lives on the line to make a living. You’re talking about somebody that has put their life on the line for somebody else’s freedom. That sounds like somebody that wants a job, that’s dedicated and willing to do what it takes to make it, to succeed. Then they get home and can’t get a job. That’s messed up.”
Among the reasons for the high rate of veteran joblessness, advocates say:
†Military culture, language and job skills are not easily translated or understood in the civilian world.
†Many veterans coming out of the service don’t know how to effectively market themselves.
†Insufficient private-sector involvement in government programs designed to help veterans transition into the civilian work force.
In decades past, there were greater numbers of veterans in the civilian workplace, including in hiring positions, who understood military language, life and the skills gained there, said Tom Tarantino, senior legislative associate with Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. But today, with an all-volunteer military and a smaller percentage of Americans in the workplace that have served in the Armed Forces, that understanding often isn’t there, he said.
Meanwhile many veterans coming out of the service have little experience in writing a civilian resume and networking and no exposure to private-sector business culture or language, said T. McCreary, a retired Rear Admiral and president of Military.com, which has an online veterans career center and is a unit of Monster Worldwide.
“There’s completely a disconnect,” between many employers and veterans, McCreary said. “It’s really a problem of communicating past each other. I really think the vast majority of civilians who hire folks, when they think about somebody in the military, they think about somebody pointing a rifle and being out on patrol. I don’t think they understand the vast array of other skill sets that they obtain. They have leadership skill sets, supervisory skill sets,” plus most of them performed other duties, he added.
For some, those duties included working in transportation or logistics, or on personnel issues or in other military jobs, he said.
He and other veterans and advocates acknowledge the onus is on veterans to make sure potential employers understand the skills and experience they possess. But veterans often need help in translating their skills, said Jimm Dodd, Veterans Program Director at National Able Network in Chicago. The nonprofit provides employment services to veterans, including placement assistance, group counseling and help with resumes and other job readiness training. It recently helped Winkfield redo his resume.
Dodd said he has explained to veterans, “you weren’t just an infantryman, you were a squad leader, which meant you had leadership responsibilities. We have to extrapolate that out for them.”
Dodd can relate to unemployed veterans. After serving 24 years in the Army, including stints in Iraq and Afghanistan, he said it took him seven months to find a job when he retired last October. During his tenure in the military, he served as a company commander and medical officer. His responsibilities over the years included providing medical care, leading hundreds of troops into combat and helping the Afghanistan National Army set up their medical units.
After leaving the military, he looked for a job that would allow him to use the organizational and management skills he learned, which he said are transferable to many industries. But, like many veterans, he found employers wanted managers with specific “widget experience,” he said.
Dan Grant, director of the Illinois Department of Veterans’ Affairs, said many employers want to hire and do hire veterans, but many veterans don’t know how to tap into that network and need assistance, which he said state agencies work to provide.
He and others noted there are tax credits available for employers who hire veterans and programs that temporarily subsidize veterans’ wages.
Among other challenges facing veterans are certification issues, veterans and advocates said.
Dodd noted military medics who worked under him learned and utilized skills including patient assessment, suturing and dispensing medications. But when they leave the military, in the civilian workplace, “they don’t get credit for the work they’ve done,” he said. “They have to struggle with training again.”
McCreary contends there should be a collaborative effort between the Veterans Administration, U.S. Department of Labor and U.S. Department of Defense with the 50 states to determine what knowledge, skills and abilities for certain jobs learned and performed in the military could be accepted for certifications and licensing within all the states. That way, he said a veteran “doesn’t have to show up in the state and start all over through the certification process when quite frankly the vet is probably more qualified to teach the course than some of the certification instructors.”
There also need to be improvements in federal Transition Assistance Programs, McCreary said in testimony before the U.S. Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee last month. He noted, “The focus needs to be on the veteran getting ahead rather than just getting out.”
The programs should include instruction by human resource professionals from the private sector who have some military knowledge, “so instructors can provide the best chance for the military member to find the best opportunity on the outside,” McCreary said. “It must include skill-specific resume writing services, information on private sector business culture and hands-on training on how to use all available private sector resources so veterans can get in front of the employers and compete in the human resource networks that exist in the private sector.”
As the federal government continues to reduce troop strength in Iraq and Afghanistan, more veterans will be returning home competing for jobs. Failing to effectively address the high rate of unemployment could add to the ranks of homeless veterans, National Able Network President and Chief Executive Officer Grace Jenkins said. The VA estimates that number at more than 100,000 currently.
“My fear is that we will wait until the problem gets to be more difficult to solve,” she said. “It shouldn’t get to that point.”
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