No Hobos

Martin Graebner was a 41st Division chaplain in New Guinea and the Philippines. Now he is a University of Chicago graduate student (philosophy), living in a tiny prefabricated shack with his wife and baby. The Graebners have seen only one movie in the last six months. By skimping in this and a dozen other ways, solemn, 31-year-old Martin Graebner manages to scrape through on $140 a month. The G.I. Bill of Rights allows him $90. He makes up the difference by acting as campus Lutheran chaplain.

Graebner's background is not entirely typical of G.I. students (most of whom have no profession yet) but his budgeting problems are. A University of Chicago School of Business survey reported last week: "Veterans attending college in the Chicago area cannot live on their Government allowance, but must dip into savings or take outside jobs to meet expenses." The figures: the average single man spends $115 a month, the average married man $165. The Government allowances are $65 and $90.

At Harvard, the counselor for veterans estimated that only 5% of the students were getting by on G.I. allotments alone. At U.C.L.A. one veteran, asked how much he budgeted for entertainment, replied: "We just can't afford it."

The colleges had not been flooded--as Chicago's Chancellor Robert M. Hutchins and others feared--with "educational hobos." Most veterans seemed grateful for the help they got, more than glad to work out the difference. For vets out for an easy time, the 52-20 club (see NATIONAL AFFAIRS) was a simpler solution. But many a vet at college still felt that the Government had promised to underwrite the whole cost of his education. So did some veteran-conscious congressmen. Three bills to increase allotments died when the 79th Congress adjourned, may be up again next session.

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