OP Ed: Raise military pay to match minimum wage for federal contract employees
Well now this just makes too much sense. I’m not gonna hold my breath for some executive action on this one.
On April 27, 2021, President Biden boldly signed an executive order raising the minimum wage for federal contract employees to $15 per hour. According to the accompanying White House fact sheet, this “ensures that hundreds of thousands of workers no longer have to work full time and still live in poverty.” In pursuing this laudable goal, the president has effectively made the federal minimum wage for unskilled contractor workers $31,000 a year.
My question is why is the contractor slinging hash in the mess hall making nearly 60 percent more than the private who is willing to risk everything for his country standing in the chow line? Currently, a new enlistee in the armed forces makes $1,650.30 per month, or roughly $19,803 annualized — an $11,400 difference. This works out to about $9.52 per hour — only if you make the fantastical assumption that new soldiers work only 40 hours a week. It takes a service member serving in the pay grade E-4 with three years of service to make the kind of scratch the dishwasher makes. To fix this, not only does pay for new enlistees need to increase by more than 57 percent, but the raise needs to be applied across the board. You cannot have privates making more than sergeants. Or sergeants more than lieutenants.
More at the source. Since military votes tend to skew to the Republican side, I expect this to be as popular as a fart in church with the current ruling party.
Thanks to Jeff LPH 3 for the story tip.
Category: "The Floggings Will Continue Until Morale Improves", "Your Tax Dollars At Work", Biden, Big Pentagon, Politics
I am not in favor of the idea that the minimum wage should be a “living wage.” Having said that, comparing the BASE PAY of an E-1 to the wage paid a contractor is disingenuous. That E-1 is provided housing, food, and medical care. Civilian contractor’s employees stateside have to provide their own housing and food and probably pay something for medical insurance.
I’m all for paying military members more, especially in light of the sacrifices they make (and that I made for 30 years), but we do need to be honest in our arguments.
When I was a kid, kids worked at McDonalds and saw it as a way to earn a few bucks while hanging out with their friends. This idea that some people have of making a living wage working at the fast food place, bagging groceries or baby sitting seems laughable to me.
Inflation is already going nuts this year. I suppose the COLA increase will be nice.
You are exactly right. Today, a contractor making minimum wage is eligible for federal housing assistance, SNAP (food assistance), Medicaid, child care and educational assistance. Net-net, burger flipper and private are closer than Mr. Dean may care to admit in his article.
Would have been nice to make $15/hr (plus OT.)
Might make those 0200 short form precrits and 0300 Rx startups almost tolerable.
Since retiring from Active Duty I’ve been one of those Government Contractors. I’ve worked for large and small companies as well as privately owned and publicly traded. If the Government was serious about this they would ban LPTA and small business set asides especially under the 8(a) auspices for these type of jobs.
If the contract is awarded for a Base year and 4 option years LPTA and then is recompeted (Lowest Priced Technically Acceptable) and the min wage is $15 at the end of the contract period and start of new contract you can expect everyone to take a pay cut.
We already have soldiers taking advantage of said disingenuous argument to get food stamps, etc. for being officially below “poverty level” (especially with kids) as we’ve all seen for years.
The last govt contract job I had (Johnston Island) housing, food, airfare to/from the island and even haircuts was provided. Plus I was being paid twice as much as most of the military personnel stationed there as well.
BTW – every civilian contractor job out there that supports the military either used to be or still is an actual military MOS. Pay the troops the same as contractors or drop the contractors.
They used to give us “compensation earnings” writeups when I was in. Some made sense, some was laughable.
One example was the $1500/mo my “housing” was worth, that housing being a 50-year old barracks room I shared with 3 other guys, when I wasn’t underway, which was pretty much always.
I sort of agree with TopGoz…I agree that minimum wage should not be a “living wage”. As others state, minimum wage is for entry level employees! Some will argue that this does not apply if you don’t work 40 hours per week, but then the Unions dogpile on to demand 40 hours and other coverage (pension, healthcare…). There should by economic standards be a difference in employment to differentiate an entry level position (i.e. McDonald’s cashier/grill/custodian) from a Living wage. People need to seek out employment for what they are qualified, and aspire to provide for a family. If you are unqualified for any job, and still need to provide for a family than either you work harder (fat chance of finding people willing to do this these days) or you rely on Government Assistance to help you provide for them. Government Assistance should not be your sole means of providing for a family!!!
I will also agree that the Military does get some additional benefits provided above their gross pay so this is not an Apples to Apples comparison. Housing, food, or BAH is provided, Healthcare is provided, and even a stipend for clothing is provided. All of these benefits in real dollars need to be considered prior to adjusting the gross pay of military members by 58% to meet minimum Federal Wage requirements.
Oh my, oh my. $1,650 ???
Father of 2 previously enlisted here (1 now an officer),
and they didn’t complain 10 years ago. Ever.
In fact, today,
E-1 > 4 mos = $1,785
E-2 = $2,001
E-4 > 3 years = $2,582.
Plus BAS
Plus BAQ
Plus (less than stellar) medical.
Hours are too long, and vacation is good (when approved).
I can make an effective argument,
that active duty pay for many 1st termers,
the marginals, the dirt bags, the slackers, and the bad attitude 4 and outs, is really good.
They are OVERPAID.
Others know, to move up, or move out.
And, it’s a great way for anyone to relocate, to get away from bad homes and1 bad towns.
A good pay bump is always good for attracting and retaining
the best possible recruits.
And perhaps the active duty should get a good increase this September.
But pulling the $1,650 line as an argument…
Wooops.
https://militarybenefits.info/2021-military-pay-charts/
^^^^ I have to agree. The myth of the “underpaid GI” is one that serves multiple narratives but it’s complete BS.
Also don’t forget that deployed soldiers get Hostile Fire/Imminent Danger pay, Combat Zone Tax Exclusion, Family Separation Pay (if married or have dependents), and Per Diem – all of which is considered non-taxable income even though if they worked in the private sector the IRS would tax the crap out of it.
If they do anything with pay they need to focus on the ranks that bear the responsibility, primarily mid-level NCO’s. If privates want that extra $$ make them earn it.
The problem with military pay is not that it’s too low, it’s that the way pay and benefits are structured they give young enlisted soldiers incentives to make dumb choices. Think about it: 18 year old PV2 just out of AIT gets moved into moldy, decrepit barracks where he shares a room with at least one other soldier. “Hey you!” details on weekends when the CSM walks through the area and sees trash on the ground. GI parties at 1800 on Sunday. Oh, and let’s not forget the mess hall/DFAC that’s likely closed half the time on weekends and when it isn’t closed it serves terrible chow. Meanwhile, the 18 year old who is married and/or has a kid gets $400 – $1000 extra pay for BAH, lives in an apartment, gets BAS (separate rations) so he can buy his own food and doesn’t have to eat in the mess hall, doesn’t get subject to “hey you!” details on weekends, and never has a squad leader or platoon sergeant going through his personal space. So what kind of incentive does that give the young GI? You ever wonder why Private Snuffy wants to get married to the first stripper he meets on Bragg Blvd or Victory Drive? Of course, this creates a whole NEW set of problems for the chain-of-command to deal with. Like when his ex-stripper wife starts banging other guys when he’s in the field and then he beats the crap out of her when he gets home. Or when he goes into debt at every business outside post trying to furnish that trailer in Spring Lake (“WE FINANCE E1 AND UP!”) and now he has to work a second job to pay off all his debts. Or when he and his wife (who had to drop out of HIGH SCHOOL to marry him when he knocked her up) get visited by County Social Services because one of the 15 animals they have living with them in their Spring Lake trailer bit their child and now he has to take time off to deal with them – which… Read more »
Been a problem since the Roman Legions.
I couldn’t tell you how many couples I knew when I was on tender duty who got married solely to avoid having to live on the ship (but dumbass E-6 single me) was expected to.
Your sleeve should dictate your compensation, not your ring finger.
Once upon a time, back in the Dark Ages, enlisted personnel needed permission to get married. Sounds rational to me. Even civilian men were expected to be able to support a family *before* they got married.
Damn, where do I sign up? For either gig. My FIRST (ht 2…oops) time clock job that taxes & SS were taken out was .60 an hour. I was 12. What it made me want to do is increase my skilz level to get a better job. And I did. Constantly. Who among us dinosaurs remember pushing hard to made PFC out of AIT to get that big $150 a month? Pepperidge Farms remembers.
Good luck finding any kind of skilled labor or hard chargers to work for $15 an hour. They making more than that sitting on their azzes. Many of those deadbeats are making more take home than a person that made a decent living, paying into SS for DECADES, is getting now.
There are so many opportunities for improving your education/skilz level now. There is NO excuse for not improving yourself. For yourself!
I hear ya. My first job was $2.25 an hour (minimum wage was $3.35, I was seasonal so therefore exempt) I was 14. I once made the mistake of calculating my hourly wage as a PV2, Base pay divided by 24 hours 7 days a week. Ignored room and board. Came out to be around $1.25 an hour.
EDIT: It was probably much less. It was 1988 and I was drunk that year.
As a TSgt with 22 plus years I was making approximately $56,316.00 a year, as a WG-9 Step 5 Air Reserve Technician I was making $55,120.00 a year. I remember as an Airmen Basic (E-1) with the GI bill coming out of my check I was making $198.00 a paycheck and as a Airmen First Class (E-3) making $366.66 a paycheck.
What was nice was when I could double dip, like we did after 9-11. I had 30 days of Military Leave on the books and 60 days of Personal Leave. So for 90 plus days I drew my ART and Military Pay (TSgt). So I double dipped from 19 Sept to sometime in Dec. Throw in Hostile Fire Pay, Family Separation Pay, and Per Diem…..I was getting some fat ass checks until I ran out of leave. Mama like the paychecks, paid off our bills.
I always felt as a military member and/or ART, I was fairly paid. I have always been able to pay my mortgage, my bills, put food on the table, and still have money to do fun things with our 3 kids. The money my wife made at her job was just extra money, until she had to quit her job due to 3 teenagers getting too big for their britches.
As a DOD civilian – making $30k a month while “Deployed” in AFGH – spent 22 months there, the Military I worked with seen the gravy train and wanted to get out and come back as Contractors or Civilians…
All this push for “$XX.00 per hour” makes me roll my eyes.
Do people not realize that money has no fixed value? The value of a dollar is not one dollar, it’s what one dollar will buy.
People fixated on “$15.00 an hour” are going to be in for a rude shock when inflation kicks in (as it’s already started to) and they’ll find that the $15.00 an hour that they thought would make them so happy now buys them the same amount (or less) than the old $10 or $12 an hour did. And pretty soon they’ll be demanding $20 an hour with no sense of irony.
When I was disability retired from my ART position in 2009 as a WG-9 Step 5, I was making $26.50 an hour, just checked the 2021 Schedule and if I was still working in my position I would be making $30.94 an hour.
And before dipshit shows up and chimes in, a couple of facts from BLS:
2.5 percent of the workforce makes federal minimum wage.
28 percent make less than $15/hr.
More money seems to be starting to reach the point of diminishing returns as far as recruitment and retention go. Time to face reality; we just can’t attract enough volunteers to meet all the “commitments” of the various services. And we really cannot afford to be spending more–we are already borrowing and printing several Trillion dollars per year.