VA makes historic commitments to hire and support military spouses

Today, the Department of Veterans Affairs signed the 4+1 Commitment – a partnership between government and private employers developed by Blue Star Families, Hiring Our Heroes, and the Department of Defense’s Military Spouse Employment Partnership to hire and support military spouses.

This commitment, championed by Dr. Jill Biden, is a voluntary commitment by employers to adopt at least one of the following military spouse employment policies that could expand employment and career opportunities for military spouses: 1) facilitate job transferability; 2) offer remote or telework; 3) offer flexible work hours; 4) provide paid or permissive Permanent Change of Station (PCS) leave. VA has committed to all four of those policies, as well as extending Leave Without Pay status to military spouses whose active-duty military members receive PCS orders.

This effort is part of President Biden’s Executive Order 14100, “Advancing Economic Security for Military and Veteran Spouses, Military Caregivers, and Survivors,” a plan to address unemployment for the 16,000+ military-connected spouses in the federal workforce.

“To build the strongest possible workforce to serve our nation’s heroes, we need to hire and support military spouses – many of whom are Veterans themselves,” said VA Secretary Denis McDonough. “We at VA are proud to make these commitments and support our nation’s military spouses every way we can.”

While VA will continue to work to fulfill the 4+1 commitments, VA already supports military spouses in many ways, including:

For more information about working at VA, visit VA.gov/jobs.