American #veterans face a wide array of unique struggles, including healthcare. For the 2024 fiscal year budget proposed by President Biden, a total of $325.1 billion was requested by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), a $16.6 billion (+5.4%) increase above the FY 2023 budget enacted level.

The proposed budget increase is geared towards supporting America’s veterans in the areas they need it most. Increasing the budget for veterans affairs is focused on increases in care, availability of resources, and quality of facilities for all veterans receiving services from the VA hospital. It is also an attempt to address the high rate of veteran suicide and homelessness.

Some specifics for the FY 2024 budget requests increase include:

• $20.3 billion in 2024 for the Cost of War Toxic Exposures Fund ($15.3 billion above 2023) for health care, research and benefits delivery associated with exposure to environmental hazards for Veterans and their survivors.
• $16.6 billion in 2024 for mental health efforts, including suicide prevention, up from $15.0 billion in 2023.
• $3.1 billion for providing homeless Veterans, and Veterans at-risk of homelessness, with permanent housing, access to health care and other supportive services.
• $257 million for women’s health and childcare programs to increase access to infertility counseling and assisted reproductive technology, eliminate copayments for contraceptive coverage, and support full-time women veteran program managers at all 172 VA medical centers.
• A historic investment of $4.1 billion (discretionary and mandatory) for construction to begin restoring VA’s aging infrastructure and providing Veterans with state-of-the-art health care facilities, as well as a $5 billion investment in medical care funding (discretionary) for non-recurring maintenance to improve medical facility infrastructure.

Those that oppose the large increase in the VA budget argue that there is very little oversight of the VA. Opponents are asking the question, why is such a large increase needed, and how are existing funds being used? Instead of increased spending, there are those that believe that more efficient spending would produce the same, if not better, results rather than a large budget increase that costs taxpayers.

The question for debate is, should the Veterans Affairs budget be increased to $325.1B for FY2024?