If you’re a business owner, CEO, recruiting agent, or in charge of hiring at your company, there’s one powerful, obvious reason that you should hire U.S. Military Veterans.

Over the last few months, we’ve had droves of businesses in various industries jumping on this opportunity to focus heavily on hiring Veterans. We truly wanted to understand why our platform was so popular. We discovered that it wasn’t because our system is modern, easy to use, and affordable – although those certainly were benefits.

The reason? Tax credits.

WOTC

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has developed the Work Opportunity Tax Credit (WOTC) for employers who hire specific groups of individuals. The following information was sourced from IRS.gov:

The Work Opportunity Tax Credit (WOTC) is a Federal tax credit available to employers for hiring individuals from certain targeted groups who have consistently faced significant barriers to employment.

WOTC joins other workforce programs that incentivize workplace diversity and facilitate access to good jobs for American workers.

The Protecting Americans from Tax Hikes Act of 2015 (the PATH Act) retroactively allows eligible employers to claim the Work Opportunity Tax Credit (WOTC) for all targeted group employee categories that were in effect prior to the enactment of the PATH Act, if the individual began or begins work for the employer after December 31, 2014 and before January 1, 2020. For tax-exempt employers, the PATH Act retroactively allows them to claim the WOTC for qualified veterans who begin work for the employer after December 31, 2014 and before January 1, 2020.

The PATH Act also added a new targeted group category to include qualified long-term unemployment recipients.

Hiring Qualified Veterans

Employers must hire “qualified Veterans” to receive a tax credit:

A “qualified Veteran” is a veteran who is any of the following:

• A member of a family receiving assistance under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) (food stamps) for at least 3 months during the first 15 months of employment.
• Unemployed for a period totaling at least 4 weeks (whether or not consecutive) but less than 6 months in the 1-year period ending on the hiring date.
• Unemployed for a period totaling at least 6 months (whether or not consecutive) in the 1-year period ending on the hiring date.
• A disabled veteran entitled to compensation for a service-connected disability hired not more than one year after being discharged or released from active duty in the U.S. Armed Forces.
• A disabled veteran entitled to compensation for a service-connected disability who is unemployed for a period totaling at least six months (whether or not consecutive) in the one-year period ending on the hiring date.

This information was one of the most powerful reasons employers sign up with Veterans ASCEND, primarily because so few employers take advantage of this opportunity. Hiring agencies and talent acquisition departments are scrambling to take this opportunity, and we’re here to help.

Save Money With Talents ASCEND

Hiring Veterans that are qualified for the positions that your company needs filled can be a challenging task. That’s why we’ve put together a state-of-the-art skills matching platform that allows you to unlock profiles. Join our mission and hundreds of other employers hiring Veterans by signing up today! To sign up, please visit https://app.talentsascend.com/