Assistance program
Life Insurance for Veterans - Direct Payments for Insurance
$7.4 Billion committed in FY2018–FY2026
- Agency
- Veterans Benefits Administration, Veterans Affairs, Department of
- Assistance
- Insurance
- CFDA number
- 64.031
- What it does
- To provide direct insurance payments, including advance payments disbursed as loans, to Veterans and their beneficiaries for claims based on death or other qualifying circumstances. Payments may be authorized for United States Government Life Insurance (USGLI), National Service Life Insurance (NSLI), and Veterans Mortgage Life Insurance (VMLI). 38 U.S.C. 1901-1963; 38 U.S.C. 2106.
- Who benefits
- Payment may be made on a claim to a designated beneficiary, a representative of the estate, a minor or incompetent, or another designee filing for benefits. 38 U.S.C. 1917. A beneficiary may assign all or a portion of his or her share of the insurance to a restricted class of the insured's relatives. 38 U.S.C. 1918(b). Payments may also be made to the policyholder for loan or dividend amounts. 38 CFR 8.11(b); 38 CFR 6.14; 38 CFR 8.10; 38 CFR 6.11.
- Who applies
- Veterans currently insured under USGLI, NSLI, or VMLI. Payment cannot be made if it would cause the insurance proceeds to revert back to a State (as in cases where there are no permissible heirs to pay). 38 U.S.C. 1950; 38 U.S.C. 1917(d).
- Authorized by
- National Service Life Insurance Act
- War Risk Insurance Act
- World War Veterans Act
- Servicemen's Indemnity and Insurance Act
- Program site
- http://www.benefits.va.gov/INSURANCE/index.asp ↗
Committed by fiscal year
* FY2026 is year-to-date — the fiscal year is still in progress, so its total is still filling in. The striped band and dashed line mark that provisional stretch.
Recipients
This program's money is paid out as non-itemized direct payments — USAspending records it under a single aggregate, so individual recipients aren't listed. The dollars and agencies above are complete; the recipient roster isn't part of the public record for programs like this.
How to read these numbers
- Committed through this program
Money committed under this assistance listing (its CFDA program), counted in the year each action happened.
- How it's paid
Most programs pay out one way — a grant, or a direct payment to individuals; the flow bar only appears when a program genuinely mixes types.
- Some recipients aren't itemized
For entitlement programs like Social Security and Medicare, the government reports one aggregate instead of naming tens of millions of people, so the recipient roster isn't part of the public record.
- Awards, counted once
An award count is the number of distinct awards with at least one action that year — each counted once, however many times it was amended.
- The colored bars
Every bar on this page splits by how the money moves:
Direct payments