The CBO, Congressional Budget Office, has some terrific suggestions on how to save money and lower the federal deficit. Those disability payments our veterans receive are in the crosshairs.

We all know the federal budget is out of control. So, what to do to solve this issue? How do we decrease the deficit and rein in spending? Stop spending on pork? Stop throwing money at Ukraine without any oversight? Why no. That’s too damned simple. 

Instead, someone has once again floated the idea of going after those darned veterans and their *checks notes* disability payments! This is the proposal with a suggested start date of January 2024, NEXT YEAR. 

VA disability compensation has increased substantially faster than inflation, both in total spending and on a per-recipient basis, a trend that CBO expects to continue. In 2021, VA paid about $110 billion in disability benefits, four times the amount that it paid in 2000 (after removing the effects of inflation), even though the number of veterans in the United States declined by more than 30 percent, from about 26 million to 19 million. Spending per recipient (after removing the effects of inflation) rose from about $11,000 in 2000 to nearly $22,000 in 2021.

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Under this option, VA would means-test all current and prospective recipients of VA disability compensation beginning in January 2024; after that date, veterans would receive full payments only if their gross household income in the prior calendar year was less than an inflation-indexed threshold for that year. Disability benefits would be phased out at a constant rate for veterans with income above the threshold: For every additional two dollars of gross household income, disability compensation would decrease by one dollar. Under that phaseout, veterans whose gross household income was $170,000 or higher in calendar year 2023 and who would have received the average annual payment would no longer receive any disability compensation from VA in calendar year 2024. There would be no adjustment in the income threshold for household size. The current eligibility requirements and benefits would not change for the surviving family members of a veteran or service member.

The income threshold below which veterans would receive full benefits in 2024 would be set at $125,000.

Wait what??!! Yes folks, you read that correctly. Let’s means test veterans disability payments and test it with the entire household income. GROSS income, not net income. Let’s penalize veterans who are on disability for service-connected issues because the feds don’t know how to budget. If a veteran and their spouse just happen to make some money, well, sucks to be them! 

By the way, what happened between the year 2000 and this year that caused such an increase in veterans on disability? Oh, just some little war in places like Afghanistan and Iraq.

Oh, but that’s not all. The good idea fairy stuck the folks at CBO hard when it comes to having our veterans bail out the budgetary mess we are in. 

Mandatory Spending
Introduce Enrollment Fees for TRICARE For Life
Introduce Minimum Out-of-Pocket Requirements in TRICARE For Life
Means-Test VA Disability Compensation for Veterans with Higher Income
End VA’s Individual Unemployability Payments to Disabled Veterans at the Full Retirement Age for Social Security
Reduce VA’s Disability Benefits for Veterans Who Are Older Than the Full Retirement Age for Social Security
Narrow Eligibility for VA’s Disability Compensation by Excluding Veterans With Low Disability Ratings
Use an Alternative Measure of Inflation to Index Social Security and Other Mandatory Programs

Discretionary Spending
Cap Increases in Basic Pay for Military Service Members
Replace Some Military Personnel With Civilian Employees
Reduce the Basic Allowance for Military Housing to 80 Percent of Average Housing Costs
Increase Prescription Drug Copayments for All Veterans
End Enrollment in VA Medical Care for Veterans in Priority Groups 7 and 8

Revenues
Include VA’s Disability Payments in Taxable Income

Read the above list again. All of this is supposed to help FIX the budget mess that our military and veterans did NOT create. 

The gymnastic justifications of how this would “work” is just amazing. Retirement pay for our veterans is already taxed, but not disability. Yet the CBO suggests disability should be taxed. This, just as the PACT Act passed last summer. 

The proposal calls for growth in funding for health care and benefits for veterans now eligible under the PACT Act, requesting $20.3 billion for the fund that pays for such benefits, an increase of more than $15.3 billion from fiscal 2023.

According to VA officials, more than 300,000 claims have been filed under the PACT Act and 161,000 people have enrolled in VA health care and services as a result of the law, which made it easier for veterans who served in the Persian Gulf War, Iraq or Afghanistan, as well as some Vietnam War vets with certain illnesses, to apply for benefits.

Here! We’ll help you with your medical care now that we admit there WERE burn pits causing major medical issues, but since you receive disability payments, we have to tax that please and thank you very little!

The US Gov will rain helicopter money upon Ukraine, promise pensions to Ukrainians, grant payments and provide other services to non-citizens — i.e.: tuition assistance, housing, food, mobile phones — but God forbid they continue to compensate a vet for a service related injury. https://t.co/COBFhXdruc

— Brad MFW (@bbwhit) March 22, 2023

Not to mention there is no retroactive date or grandfathering. You have decades worth of veterans who bought homes, retired, or made different decisions partly based on their disability payments that they earned. No chance any legislator signs their name.

— Chaps (@UncleChaps) March 22, 2023

Exactly. The $170K is a pretty arbitrary number for sure. Yet supposedly $580 billion in savings would be realized off the backs of our military and veterans, who already are and have given so much in service to this country. 

Trying once again to penalize our military and veterans to fix the budgetary mess created by Democrats AND Republicans isn’t the way. These proposals should never see the light of day. 

Feature Photo Credit: Soldier American Flag via Pixabay, cropped and modified