This paper is an attempt to evaluate the effects of the post-war educational rehabilitation programs for veterans (“GI Bills”) on the educational composition of the male population of the United States. Various sources of statistical data are integrated to produce estimates of the effects. The analysis leads to the conclusion that, even if the benefits of the GI education and training programs had not been available, the sharply rising trend in the formal educational level of the male population observed before the war would have continued at substantially the same general level. The GI programs are viewed primarily as responses to the growing demand for formal education in a society where social organization and value complexes were undergoing change.