Army "Right Sizing"

[Pags]

In honesty, I haven't been following the details of this whole debacle very closely, but what, if anything have the SECDEF or the Service Chiefs had to say about this?

 

[e6bflyer]

To my knowledge, nothing. There has been a startling silence from the puzzle palace. I suspect they may have been told either to shut up and color or are choosing their battles which include protecting their service budgets and pet programs. Anyone heard anything different?

I, for one, am just about done with McCain being the barometer for all military stuff in the senate. The guy is an amazing person who endured and excelled under some incredibly tough conditions and my hat is off to him. On the flip side, he is married to a trust fund baby and is kinda acting like a giant doucher.

 

[Pags]

To my knowledge, nothing. There has been a startling silence from the puzzle palace. I suspect they may have been told either to shut up and color or are choosing their battles which include protecting their service budgets and pet programs. Anyone heard anything different?

I, for one, am just about done with McCain being the barometer for all military stuff in the senate. The guy is an amazing person who endured and excelled under some incredibly tough conditions and my hat is off to him. On the flip side, he is married to a trust fund baby and is kinda acting like a giant doucher.

An article I read earlier today mentioned that in the 90s when a similar cut was attempted, the service chiefs went before congress and told them it was a terrible idea that would have impacts on the future of national security and wasn't worth the short term gain.

One has to wonder what the service chiefs would have said if CVs, JSF, V-22, etc had been offered up instead.

 

[Recovering LSO]

Yesterday, Washington state Boeing workers voted to give up their pensions to keep their jobs.

in turn for fairly generous matching 401k-ish plans, while many of the machinists will see their pay increase over the $100,000 threshold. Apples and oranges.

My advice is to:
1) Don't even need to invest it, just throw 10% of your income in a savings account.

this is bad advice.

For every duty station I've been in the Navy, it has been considered a big no-no to discuss career options in the outside world. I understand why this culture exists

this is a local problem for you. I've never worked for a CO who didn't allow (or even ask for) open conversation and consideration of options. My opinion, the more parochial the community, the more taboo this line of conversation....

It will be an initiative that only rewards the worst performers.

huh?

 

[Renegade One]

I talked to a few companies that were looking for JO's to hire that wanted to pay 60K per year, I thought that was low for a JO after 4-8 years of service.

Thought this was a good thread to post this interesting article…NORs post just seemed like a good springboard:
Thank You For Your Military Service — Now Here Are 9 Reasons Why I Won't Hire You

Read more: http://www.careerattraction.com/con...-9-reasons-why-i-wont-hire-you/#ixzz2pYB5ZQ00

 

[exNavyOffRec]

Thought this was a good thread to post this interesting article…NORs post just seemed like a good springboard:
Thank You For Your Military Service — Now Here Are 9 Reasons Why I Won't Hire You

Read more: http://www.careerattraction.com/con...-9-reasons-why-i-wont-hire-you/#ixzz2pYB5ZQ00

I thought this was a very good article and I can relate as a recently transitioned vet, I will need to re-read this as well.

 

[BigRed389]

I'll admit I was on the fence about the cuts until I read this: http://www.businessinsider.com/retirement-cuts-sacrifice-integrity-2014-1

Retirement is still a long way off for me, and the only thing that really bugged me was that they were also including disabled veterans but this quote put things in a different perspective:

No war bonds. No draft. No appeal to our richest citizens to finance an expedition. We’ve been at war for a dozen solid years without asking Americans at-large to make a single material sacrifice. Now we turn to veterans and expect them to foot the bill.

 

[Renegade One]

I'll admit I was on the fence about the cuts until I read this: ...this quote put things in a different perspective:
"[Edited] We’ve been at war for a dozen solid years without asking Americans at-large to make a single material sacrifice. Now we turn to veterans and expect them to foot the bill.

I get the part about no WWII-era style rationing, shortages, the draft, etc., but I daresay there are tens (if not hundreds) of thousands of Americans-at-large who have paid, and will continue to pay, a huge sacrifice in terms of lost, horribly wounded and disabled family members. I think that's enough.

I hope we never again have to see the whole WWII-style stuff again.

 

[BigRed389]

I get the part about no WWII-era style rationing, shortages, the draft, etc., but I daresay there are tens (if not hundreds) of thousands of Americans-at-large who have paid, and will continue to pay, a huge sacrifice in terms of lost, horribly wounded and disabled family members. I think that's enough.

I hope we never again have to see the whole WWII-style stuff again.

I'm hoping you're saying that based on just the quote I pulled out of context, and not from reading the actual article.

 

[RobLyman]

The link above is great. Having transitioned successfully to the civilian world and then back to the military almost 10 years later, I can say there is a lot of truth in it. Also conducting many interview in my civilian career and now in my pseudo civilian/guard career I feel I am very qualified to say that.

What I would like to say is that the military pension cuts represent a break in trust to our service men and women. After initial commitments, we all have to constantly reevaluate our career decisions, just like our civilian counterparts. But as servicemen we have a lot less to say about our careers. Sure, we can make ourselves as marketable as possible, but we can't simply leave at the drop of a hat for better opportunities. My first year as a civilian I saw my salary go from $35k to $70k because I was able to control my own training and invested my time and money that resulted in a significant return on investment. Not a year went by in my 10 year civilian career that I didn't gain a new skill and professional credential (mostly due to my own efforts).

In the military those opportunities are nowhere near as numerous. Add to that the hardship of not being able to set down roots, buy a house, etc...and military life just doesn't provide the same opportunities. So, we have to look at the less tangible benefits when choosing to go or stay. When those benefits like pension are taken away or decreased, it retroactively diminishes the time we spent in the military. Sure, the same thing happens in the civilian world, but that is one of the reasons we stay in the military... so it doesn't happen to us.

 

[lowflier03]

I get the part about no WWII-era style rationing, shortages, the draft, etc., but I daresay there are tens (if not hundreds) of thousands of Americans-at-large who have paid, and will continue to pay, a huge sacrifice in terms of lost, horribly wounded and disabled family members. I think that's enough.

I hope we never again have to see the whole WWII-style stuff again.

Sorry, but I have to disagree with you on this one. Those "Americans at large" didn't volunteer for shit. The disabled servicemembers did. Joe schmuckatelli may know a little something about the war thanks to media and his family who served, (if he has them) But he didn't raise his hand and go into harms way. He had the benefit of spending the past 5, 11, 20, etc. years back in the good ole' USA doing his best to get rich in the civilian sector.

 

[jmcquate]

Unfortunately, the veterans of OIF /OEF are a relatively low number of the overall population compared to past wars and have lesser political clout than the Society of Cincinnatus or the GAR or that the American legion had after WWII and Korea.

 

[wink]

The 20 year pension as we know it may be going away, but a new arrangement may not be as big a hit as it would seem. RLSO mentioned the new Boeing package. OK for them, but not for the military? Lots of research out there about various pension transition plans and in many cases the employee does better in terms of retirement income. That is why I say we have to get ahead of this and make the very best of it. Yes the government wastes billions and one can argue priorities are mess up. But it isn't going to get your 20 year pensions off the table forever. The longer we wait to buy into a major overhaul the more painful it will be. To date the only material change has been a decrease in the automatic amount a retiree's pension goes up annually, by just one percent. And then, only to age 60, when it is presumed the retiree will be depending on his pension more. Sorry, all the angst is chicken shit. In the last budget debate on the Hill I bet 90% of us was decrying the wailing and gnashing of teeth over a reduction in the expected increased to the federal budget. One percent reduction in cola until age 60 is absolutely survivable. It isn't the money. It isn't the broken "promise." It is the camel's nose. Kick the camel out of the tent and put a halter on it. The current system will not survive. We have to be a part of the change.

 

[Hotdogs]

The 20 year pension as we know it may be going away, but a new arrangement may not be as big a hit as it would seem. RLSO mentioned the new Boeing package. OK for them, but not for the military? Lots of research out there about various pension transition plans and in many cases the employee does better in terms of retirement income. That is why I say we have to get ahead of this and make the very best of it. Yes the government wastes billions and one can argue priorities are mess up. But it isn't going to get your 20 year pensions off the table forever. The longer we wait to buy into a major overhaul the more painful it will be. To date the only material change has been a decrease in int automatic amount a retiree's pension goes up annually by just one percent. And then, only to age 60, when it is presumed the retiree will be depending on his pension more. Sorry, all the angst is chicken shit. In the last budget debate on the Hill I bet 90% of us was decrying the gnashing and wailing of teeth over a reduction in the expected increased to the federal budget. One percent reduction in cola until age 60 is absolutely survivable. It isn't the money. It isn't the broken "promise." It is the camel's nose. Kick the camel out of the tent and put a halter on it. The current system will not survive. We have to be a part of the change.

I think your not only wrong, but completely misinformed. The current system has been surviving for the last 20+ years and will continue to survive.

Start reading:
http://www.moaa.org/MRDecBottomLine/


I hate the crimes as much as the next guy but it makes a good point:
http://www.armytimes.com/article/20131124/BENEFITS02/311240019

About one-third of all Pentagon acquisition programs run over budget to a degree that requires DoD to formally notify Congress under the so-called Nunn-McCurdy Amendment, named for the sponsors of a 1982 law designed to flag hardware projects that run more than 25 percent above initial cost estimates.
That’s hardly a secret; a decades-long line of government reports has harshly criticized the way the Pentagon develops and buys weapons.
The most common cause for those cost overruns is “poor management,” according to an internal Pentagon report released in June called the “Performance of the Defense Acquisition System.”
A Government Accountability Office report issued in October noted that DoD’s 85 “major acquisition programs” in 2012 were a collective $411 billion over their initial cost estimates.
That staggering sum of money by itself could wipe out eight of the 10 years of planned budget cuts under the sequestration law.
Some acquisition programs that consume billions of dollars are never completed. For example, the Army in 2009 canceled its Future Combat Systems after spending $18 billion, mostly on research of high-tech devices that never got beyond the developmental stages.
In some cases, the military finishes building hardware but immediately decides it is no longer needed. The Air Force spent more than $1 billion buying C-27J Spartan cargo planes, only to send many of them directly to “the bone yard,” an aircraft storage facility in Arizona.
Air Force officials say the C-27J’s cost per-flight-hour is too high, and the service cannot afford to operate and maintain the aircraft.
And sometimes the services simply don’t need what they claim to need. The Marine Corps set in motion plans to buy 200 heavy-lift CH-53K helicopters, but when the DoD inspector general took a close look at the decision earlier this year, it found that the Corps had not followed the military’s own procurement rules and could not justify the last batch of 44 helicopters, estimated to cost $22 billion.

Are you kidding me?

 

[Recovering LSO]

RLSO mentioned the new Boeing package. OK for them, but not for the military?

Yeah. Absolutely okay for them and not for me. Let me know when I can organize into a labor union and push back against my employer. Let me know when a Boeing Machinist gets sent on a 9, 10, 11, 12+ month deployment, repeatedly. There's probably a contractual mandate that he gets his birthday off...

I've tried really hard to keep something of an open mind when reading your ideas/opinions/posts, but you've lost me.

It is this simple, and doesn't need to be made any more difficult: I joined and made an informed decision to stick around with the understanding (also called a contract), that I would earn a defined benefit package for a specific volume of service. If the retirement plan is going to be altered, so be it, but start with the folks who are signing the dotted line today - give them the opportunity to say no. Give them the opportunity to say no like many of us would have and will if the goal posts continue to move with ever changing political winds.