page_title: G.I. Bill
hierarchical_section_title: G.I. Bill
caption_attribution_description: English: President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs the G.I. Bill in the Oval Office, with (l to r) Bennett “Champ” Clark, J. Hardin Peterson, John Rankin, Paul Cunningham, Edith N. Rogers, J.M. Sullivan, Walter George, John Stelle, Robert Wagner, Scott W. Lucas, and Alben Barkley; June 22, 1944
context_page_description: The Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944, commonly known as the G.I. Bill, was a law that provided a range of benefits for returning World War II veterans. The original G.I. Bill expired in 1956, but the term "G.I. Bill" is still used to refer to programs created to assist U.S. military veterans.
  It was largely designed and passed through Congress in 1944 in a bipartisan effort led by the American Legion who wanted to reward practically all wartime veterans. Since the First World War the Legion had been in the forefront of lobbying Congress for generous benefits for war veterans. Roosevelt, by contrast, wanted a much smaller program focused on poor people regardless of military service. The final bill provided immediate financial rewards for practically all World War II veterans, thereby avoiding the highly disputed postponed life insurance policy payout for World War I veterans that had caused political turmoil in the 1920s and 1930s. Benefits included low-cost mortgages, low-interest loans to start a business or farm, one year of unemployment compensation, and dedicated payments of tuition and living expenses to attend high school, college, or vocational school.
context_section_description: The Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944, commonly known as the G.I. Bill, was a law that provided a range of benefits for returning World War II veterans (commonly referred to as G.I.s).  The original G.I. Bill expired in 1956, but the term "G.I. Bill" is still used to refer to programs created to assist U.S. military veterans.
  It was largely designed and passed through Congress in 1944 in a bipartisan  effort led by the American Legion who wanted to reward practically all wartime veterans. Since the First World War the Legion had been in the forefront of lobbying Congress for generous benefits for war veterans. Roosevelt, by contrast, wanted a much smaller program focused on poor people regardless of military service. The final bill provided immediate financial rewards for practically all World War II veterans, thereby avoiding the highly disputed postponed life insurance policy payout for World War I veterans that had caused political turmoil in the 1920s and 1930s. Benefits included low-cost mortgages, low-interest loans to start a business or farm, one year of unemployment compensation, and dedicated payments of tuition and living expenses to attend high school, college, or vocational school. These benefits were available to all veterans who had been on active duty during the war years for at least 90 days and had not been dishonorably discharged.
  By 1956, 7.8 million veterans had used the G.I. Bill education benefits, some 2.2 million to attend colleges or universities and an additional 5.6 million for some kind of training program. Historians and economists judge the G.I. Bill a major political and economic success—especially in contrast to the treatments of World War I veterans—and a major contribution to U.S. stock of human capital that encouraged long-term economic growth. However, the G.I. Bill received criticism for directing some funds to for-profit educational institutions. The G.I. Bill was racially discriminatory, as it was intended to accommodate Jim Crow laws. Due to the discrimination by local and state governments, as well as by private actors in housing and education, the G.I. failed to benefit African Americans as it did with white Americans. Columbia University historian Ira Katznelson described the G.I. Bill as affirmative action for whites. The G.I. Bill has been criticized for increasing racial wealth disparities.
  The Post-9/11 Veterans Educational Assistance Act of 2008 further expanded benefits, providing veterans with funding for the full cost of any public college in their state. The G.I. Bill was also modified through the passage of the Forever GI Bill in 2017.
caption: President Roosevelt signs the G.I. Bill into law on June 22, 1944
exif: {"Image ImageWidth": "1436", "Image ImageLength": "973", "Image BitsPerSample": "8", "Image Compression": "Uncompressed", "Image PhotometricInterpretation": "3", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image SamplesPerPixel": "1", "Image XResolution": "150", "Image YResolution": "150", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CS4 Windows", "Image DateTime": "2010:02:04 09:48:47", "Image ExifOffset": "236", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "374", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "7388", "EXIF ColorSpace": "Uncalibrated", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "1436", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "973"}