Then the GI Bill of 1944 paid the college tuition of hundreds of thousands of veterans, catapulting a generation of men into professional careers—but few black veterans benefited, as local administrators funneled most black servicemen to segregated vocational schools. The mortgage benefit in the GI Bill pushed the postwar white homeownership rate to three out of four white families—but with federally sanctioned housing discrimination, the black and Latinx rates stayed at around two out of five, despite the attempts of veterans of color to participate.
