6,398 veterans died by suicide in 2023 — 17.5 every day. 61% were not receiving VA care. The government asked them to serve. That promise is binding.
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17.5 veterans die by suicide every single day — a toll greater than all U.S. combat deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan combined. The veteran suicide rate is 57% higher than the rate for non-veteran adults, and the crisis has not improved meaningfully in a decade despite billions in spending.
The causes are structural, not personal. First, transition failures: the military trains service members intensively for combat but spends almost no time preparing them for civilian life. The Transition Assistance Program consists of a handful of briefings in the final days of service — a bureaucratic checkbox that does nothing to address the loss of identity, purpose, and community that veterans report as the hardest part of leaving the military.
Second, PTSD and TBI undertreatment. An estimated 11-20% of veterans who served in Iraq and Afghanistan have PTSD in any given year, and roughly 380,000 service members have sustained traumatic brain injuries since 2000. Yet the VA's mental health workforce is chronically understaffed, wait times for initial mental health appointments average 30+ days at many facilities, and evidence-based treatments like prolonged exposure therapy and cognitive processing therapy are not consistently available across the system.
Third, VA access barriers. 61% of veterans who died by suicide were not receiving VA care at the time of their death. Eligibility rules exclude many veterans — particularly those with other-than-honorable discharges, many of whom were separated for behavior directly caused by PTSD, military sexual trauma, or TBI. Rural veterans face facility distances that make regular appointments impossible. And the stigma of seeking mental health help — reinforced by military culture — prevents many from ever walking through the door.
Fourth, rural veteran isolation. Nearly a quarter of all veterans live in rural areas, far from VA facilities and often disconnected from the communities and support networks that urban veterans can access. Rural veterans have suicide rates 20% higher than their urban counterparts, and telehealth — while expanding — cannot fully substitute for in-person care in crisis situations.
The fundamental problem is the disconnect between promises made and promises kept. The government asked these men and women to serve, placed them in harm's way, and told them their country would take care of them. For too many, that promise has been broken. The Common Good plan treats this as exactly what it is: a national emergency. Read the full veterans policy and the healthcare plan for how the pieces fit together.
The VA is simultaneously the largest integrated healthcare system in the country and one of the most dysfunctional bureaucracies in the federal government. The problem isn't the clinicians — VA doctors and nurses consistently rate among the best. The problem is the system around them.
Wait times remain the VA's most visible failure. Despite the 2014 wait-time scandal that revealed veterans dying while waiting for appointments, average wait times for primary care are still 20+ days at many facilities. For specialty care — cardiology, orthopedics, neurology — waits of 40-60 days are common. Mental health appointments, the most urgent need in the system, average 30+ days for initial evaluations at understaffed facilities.
Understaffing drives everything. The VA has roughly 35,000 unfilled clinical positions at any given time — doctors, nurses, psychologists, social workers. The federal pay scale makes it difficult to compete with private-sector salaries, particularly for specialists. Rural VA facilities face the worst shortages, with some clinics operating at 50-60% of their staffing targets.
The claims backlog is a bureaucratic catastrophe. Over 900,000 disability claims are pending at any given time, with average processing times exceeding 150 days. Appeals take years. The PACT Act — which rightly expanded eligibility for burn pit and toxic exposure veterans — added millions of new claims to a system that was already overwhelmed. Veterans who are sick right now are waiting months for the government to acknowledge their service-connected conditions.
Facilities in disrepair: the VA's infrastructure backlog exceeds $50 billion. Many VA medical centers were built in the 1950s and 1960s and have not been meaningfully updated. Reports have documented mold, pest infestations, failing HVAC systems, and outdated medical equipment at facilities across the country. Veterans who served in modern military facilities come home to receive care in buildings that would fail private-sector inspections.
PACT Act implementation gaps: the law was a landmark achievement, but without adequate funding for staffing, technology, and outreach, its promise remains partially unfulfilled. Millions of newly eligible veterans don't know they qualify. Those who do apply face the same claims backlog that existed before the law passed. The Common Good plan calls for full PACT Act implementation — not just the authorization, but the appropriations, staffing, and infrastructure required to make the law real. See the budget and fiscal responsibility page for how we fund it.
The Common Good plan treats the veteran crisis as what it is — a broken promise that the federal government is obligated to repair. The plan addresses every major failure point: eligibility, mental health access, suicide prevention, homelessness, transition support, toxic exposure, and economic opportunity.
The plan is built on eight core provisions, each targeting a specific systemic failure that the current VA structure has failed to fix despite decades of reform attempts.
For the complete plan with legislative detail, cost projections, and sourcing, see the full veterans issue page.
Every major military power provides veteran care. But the structure, accessibility, and outcomes vary dramatically. The United States spends more per veteran than most peer nations — and gets worse outcomes on nearly every measure that matters.
| Country | VA Equivalent | MH Access | Suicide Rate | Homelessness | Transition | Disability Wait |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| United States | VA (separate system) | 30+ day avg. wait | 17.5/day | 37,000+ | TAP (3-5 days) | 150+ days |
| United Kingdom | NHS + Veterans UK | Integrated via NHS | Lower than civilian | ~6,000 | Career Transition Partnership | ~90 days |
| Canada | Veterans Affairs Canada | Integrated via provincial | Comparable to civilian | ~2,600 | My VAC Account + case mgmt | ~120 days |
| Australia | DVA + universal Medicare | Same-day via Medicare | Declining (funded programs) | Minimal | ADF Transition Program | ~90 days |
| Israel | IDF + universal healthcare | Integrated + mandatory | Well below US rate | Near zero | 12-month structured | ~60 days |
| Germany | Bundeswehr + universal care | Integrated via public insurance | Well below US rate | Near zero | Vocational retraining | ~75 days |
The pattern is striking: countries with universal healthcare systems integrate veteran care into the broader system rather than maintaining a separate, siloed VA. Australia, Israel, and Germany all provide veteran-specific services on top of universal coverage that every citizen already receives. The result is fewer gaps, faster access, and dramatically lower rates of veteran homelessness and suicide.
The US is unique in maintaining a massive, standalone healthcare system exclusively for veterans — while simultaneously failing to cover all veterans within it. The Common Good plan bridges this gap by expanding VA eligibility while also pursuing universal healthcare for all Americans, so veterans always have a backstop.
On any given night, more than 37,000 veterans are homeless in America — sleeping in shelters, in cars, under bridges, or on the streets. Over the course of a year, roughly 55,000-60,000 veterans experience homelessness. These are people who served their country and came home to find it had no place for them.
The causes of veteran homelessness mirror the broader housing crisis — but with additional factors that make veterans uniquely vulnerable. PTSD, traumatic brain injury, substance use disorders related to service, the loss of the military's structured environment, and the inadequacy of transition assistance all contribute. Many homeless veterans had stable housing when they left the military and lost it months or years later as untreated conditions worsened and support systems failed.
Housing First works. The evidence is unambiguous. Programs that provide permanent housing without preconditions — no requirement to be sober, employed, or enrolled in treatment first — consistently outperform traditional "treatment first" approaches. Cities like Houston, which implemented Housing First aggressively, have reduced veteran homelessness by over 60%. The model works because stability comes first: people cannot address their mental health, substance use, or employment challenges while sleeping on the street.
HUD-VASH (Housing and Urban Development - Veterans Affairs Supportive Housing) is the federal government's primary tool for veteran homelessness. It combines Section 8 housing vouchers with VA case management and clinical services. The program has housed over 150,000 veterans since its inception and is widely considered one of the most effective federal housing programs ever created. But funding has plateaued, waitlists have grown, and in high-cost housing markets, the voucher amounts are too low to secure housing.
The Common Good plan expands HUD-VASH vouchers, increases voucher amounts in high-cost markets, establishes Housing First as the default approach for all VA homeless programs, and integrates housing assistance into the transition process so veterans don't become homeless in the first place. See the housing policy for how this fits into the broader affordability plan.
Public discourse about veterans oscillates between hollow "thank you for your service" gestures and harmful stereotypes that undermine support for the policies veterans actually need. Here are four myths — and what the evidence shows.
Myth: "Veterans are broken."
Reality: The vast majority of veterans transition successfully and lead productive civilian lives. Veterans are more likely than non-veterans to be employed, to start businesses, and to volunteer in their communities. The stereotype of the "damaged veteran" is not only inaccurate — it actively discourages veterans from seeking help when they need it, because they don't want to be seen as broken. The issue isn't that veterans are fragile. It's that the systems designed to support them are inadequate.
Myth: "The VA is unfixable."
Reality: VA healthcare, when properly funded and staffed, consistently outperforms private-sector healthcare on quality measures. The VA's electronic health records system was once the gold standard. VA patient satisfaction scores regularly exceed those of private hospitals. The problem has never been the VA's model — it's chronic underfunding, political neglect, and a bureaucratic structure that prevents the system from adapting. The fix is investment, modernization, and accountability — not privatization, which would cost more and deliver less.
Myth: "Veteran homelessness is about addiction."
Reality: While substance use disorders affect some homeless veterans, the primary drivers of veteran homelessness are housing affordability, inadequate transition support, and untreated mental health conditions — particularly PTSD. Many homeless veterans have no substance use issues at all. The "addiction" framing is used to justify denying housing until veterans complete treatment — a "treatment first" approach that the evidence conclusively shows does not work. Housing First — providing housing without preconditions — produces dramatically better outcomes because stable housing is the foundation on which recovery is built, not the reward for it.
Myth: "We already do enough for veterans."
Reality: 17.5 veterans die by suicide every day. 37,000+ are homeless. Disability claims take 150+ days. 35,000 VA clinical positions are unfilled. 61% of veterans who die by suicide were not in VA care. The gap between rhetoric and reality is vast. Flying flags, offering discounts, and saying "thank you for your service" costs nothing and changes nothing. What veterans need is adequate funding for mental health care, housing, transition support, and a disability claims system that actually works. That requires money, political will, and accountability — not gestures. See the full veterans plan for what "enough" actually looks like.
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17.5 veterans die by suicide every day. 37,000+ are homeless. The VA is understaffed and overwhelmed. Read the full plan and see exactly how we honor the promise — with sources, costs, and implementation details.