By RICK MAZE
Army Times
WASHINGTON -- Young veterans continue to have problems finding jobs even as the overall economy is improving, according to Friday's employment situation report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The national unemployment rate fell to 8.5 percent in December and 200,000 jobs were created, continuing a trend of slow but steady improvement since August.
However, for Iraq- and Afghanistan-era veterans -- those separated from active duty since Sept. 11, 2001 -- the jobless rate for December was 13.3 percent. That is greater than the 11.7 percent unemployment rate for this generation of veterans recorded in December 2010 and also greater than the 11.1 percent reported for November 2011.
Month-to-month differences in the unemployment rate for veterans could result from veterans making up a small part of the overall employment survey, but the trend still shows that young veterans are having a much harder time than non-veterans and older veterans in finding work.
For veterans of all generations, the unemployment rate for December was 7.7 percent, slightly up from the 7.4 percent jobless rate reported for November but down from the 8.3 percent reported in December 2010.
Many programs are under way or in planning stages to try to help veterans find jobs. Three federal agencies -- the Defense Department, Labor Department and Veterans Affairs Department -- are in the process of putting in place a veterans' employment package that became law last year.
New programs are supposed to tackle some of the biggest hurdles facing unemployed veterans. These challenges include getting employers to recognize the value of skills and responsibilities learned in the military, teaching vets new skills in industries where a military occupational specialty isn't a good match, and helping vets learn skills for jobs that typically don't interest someone who has recently left the military.
The House and Senate veterans' affairs committees, which wrote the employment package called the Vow to Hire Heroes Act, are watching closely how new transition assistance and job training programs are created to make certain help is available in the short term.
Rep. Jeff Miller, R-Fla., the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs chairman, said his goal is for the employment rate for all veterans to be cut to less than 5 percent within two years.