As over 40,000 troops prepare to draw down from Iraq by years’ end, many soldiers plan to leave the service and re-enter the civilian workforce.

At a time when the nation’s unemployment rate is trending at record levels and the unemployment rate for veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan is already 11.7%, the job outlook for veterans seems pretty bleak. The numbers are even more frightening for returning women whose jobless rate has spiked to approximately 15%.

After dozens of unanswered job applications grew to hundreds, Donna Bachler, who returned more than four years ago from her Army deployment to Kuwait, decided in some instances to keep her veteran status off her resumes. “I don’t get it,” the college graduate and former drill sergeant, says. “A lot of employers have no idea what a military background brings to the table… especially for these women who were so driven to push themselves” and serve next to men.

Male veterans of the post-9/11 era are, on average, more likely than their female counterparts to find work and collect higher salaries when they are hired. The statistics are troubling, but what is really behind them?

A troubling question that some may be asking is whether women who fight wars are perceived negatively in the civilian world. Are worries about post-traumatic stress disorder spooking employers into thinking that veterans – women in particular- might crack in their cubicles or on the assembly line?

Is the fact that  women tend to leave the service at younger ages than their male counterparts and the young adults, in general, are often the ones struggling to build careers in our current economy to blame?

Or perhaps, the potential explanation to the high unemployment rate among veterans is employers’ inability to recognize and translate military experience to civilian experience in determining qualifications.

Regardless of the factors that are contributing to the high rate of unemployed for both male and female veterans, action needs to be taken to ensure that those who have sacrificed to serve our country are given fair opportunity to support themselves and their families upon return.  To quote Matt Flavin from his post on the White House Blog, “I think all Americans can agree that veterans shouldn’t have to fight for a job once they come home from the fight overseas.”

One advance in assisting veterans to find employment is virtual job fairs. Milicruit, for example, was created for both veterans looking to reenter civilian life and employers seeking to hire veterans. The interactive site allows veterans to view postings, chat with company representatives and submit resumes and provides employers screening tools and access to a large pool of veteran employment candidates. Milicruit has a nationwide virtual career fair planned on November 10th for veterans and their spouses.

In addition to the efforts being put forth by veteran’s advocates and various agencies, the employment issue has also caught government attention.  President Obama has called on the private sector to hire or train as many as 100,000 unemployed veterans or their spouses by the end of 2013 and is pushing an incentive-laden plan to hire veterans as part of the larger jobs bill.  The veterans’ portion of the bill may be voted on separately and would, if passed, put into effect tax credits for companies that hire unemployed or disabled veterans.

According to Flavin, “Over the weeks and months ahead, we’ll continue to take actions like these that will improve the economy and help middle class families including our nation’s veterans because we simply can’t wait.”