VA hires at record rates to deliver care and benefits to Veterans

WASHINGTON — Buoyed by the PACT Act, the VA this year has hired employees at record rates to help better deliver world-class care and benefits to Veterans, their families, caregivers, and survivors.

The Veterans Health Administration increased its total workforce by 13,627 (3.6%) between October 2022 and April 2023, the highest growth rate for VHA in over 20 years. The Veteran Benefits Administration hired 4,120 employees during the same time period, the highest growth rate for VBA in 15 years. VHA now has 393,500 employees, and VBA now has more than 28,000 employees for the first time ever.

This hiring push will help VA continue to deliver more care and more benefits to more Veterans than ever before. It will also help VA implement the PACT Act, the largest expansion of Veteran care and benefits in generations.

“At VA, we’re hiring and retaining the best, most talented, and dedicated employees in health care — because Veterans deserve to be treated by the very best,” said Under Secretary for Health Dr. Shereef Elnahal. “With this hiring push, we’re bringing on new people with one goal in mind: providing world-class care to every Veteran who entrusts us with their health.”

“The more people we hire, the faster we can deliver Veterans the benefits they deserve — it’s as simple as that,” said Under Secretary for Benefits Josh Jacobs. “There’s no better mission in the world than serving Veterans, their families, caregivers and survivors, and we encourage anyone who might be interested in joining us to go to VA.gov/Jobs today.”

Thanks to recent hiring efforts, in 2022, VA processed a record number of Veteran benefit claims — delivering more than $112 billion to Veterans — and is currently 15% ahead of that record pace in 2023. In 2022, VA also provided more than 91 million outpatient visits to the 9 million Veterans enrolled in VA health care.

In total, VHA aims to hire a record 52,000 new employees in fiscal year 2023 to meet increasing Veteran demand. VHA is ahead of pace, having hired 32,921 new employees from October through April — the most ever in the first seven months of the year.

For more information about VA’s hiring efforts, visit VA’s new workforce dashboard. VA is publishing this dashboard once a month to document our hiring efforts. The next dashboard, which will reflect the numbers listed above, will publish in June.

Visit VA.gov/Jobs to learn more about working at VA.