Smaller payraise for troops?

| January 26, 2010

A few weeks ago I wrote that retired military checks got smaller this year compared to last year, despite the fact that our costs of living had risen – 2.7% the last six months of 2009 according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Well, now it’s time for the active duty to shoulder their part of the White House budget, too, according to Stars & Stripes;

The White House will propose a 1.4 percent military pay increase in 2011, which if approved would be the smallest since the start of all-volunteer military in 1973.

That figure represents a steep drop from the 3.9 percent boost troops saw earlier this month.

White House officials said the 1.4 percent figure, which will be included in the fiscal 2011 budget to be unveiled Monday, is based on projected private sector wage increases for next year.

So even though the cost of living is increasing, the cost of living increases are decreasing. I think I said back in 2008 that the first people to bear the brunt of Democrat spending increases will be the military and retirees. I’m not prophetic, I’m just speaking from experience. Keep that in mind when you listen to the State of the Union Address.

Category: Barack Obama/Joe Biden, Military issues

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Spade

Just in case anybody in uniform is wondering:

POTUS: $400,000 a year
Speaker of the House: $223,500
Senate/House leadership: $193,000
Congressman: $174,000
That doesn’t include per diem, flying to Europe or the Caribbean on ‘fact finding trips’ or whatever, etc.

Congress voted to not get a raise in 2010. They’ll get one automatically in 2011 unless they decide to vote to not have one (they get one automatically). Of course, a 3% COL increase effects the bottom rung way more than the top.

Enjoy your MRE.

Gary

And what about other Federal employees? What kind of COLA are they getting?

dutch508

democratic president?
low military pay raise?

didn’t see that one coming.

AW1 Tim

It’s alright, I guess. I need to lose a little weight anyway.

UpNorth

Thanks, Dutch, saved me from stating the obvious. Yeah, they get a COL raise, so they can forgo a “pay raise”. Meanwhile, as for the peasants, “let them eat cake”.

Frankly Opinionated

This veteran is on unSocial inSecurity, and we get no COLA, and they raise the medical insurance cost on us.
Jonn said: “Keep that in mind when you listen to the State of the Union Address.” Un uh, you watch it Jonn, I will be reading yours and others evaluations of it. I am an ol’ dude and watching a professional, bare faced liar in action would just ruin my whole week. Someone will come up with the number of times he says “I”, “me”, and bashes GWB. I am sure that what I read here in the AAR will be sufficient to get an honest, accurate view of what it was that he spewed.
Thanks Jonn, for being tough enough to take listening/watching that slimer. I am sure that COB6 will offer us his take on it as well.

“Never Forget that Ft Hood Texas was attacked by radical islam enabled by political correctness on 11/5/09!”

TSO

Actually, this is a gimick as well. And a dumb one.

They put it in as this, and then CBO and OMB score this meager raise, and then use that number to show that he is keeping overall costs down. Now, no way this number sticks through the Armed Services committee, they bump to atleast 2.5%. Then, when the budget comes from HASC, Obama says, My budget was considerably less, I was trying to keep the bill down etc. “Reluctantly” he signs it.

He’s weighing that we will make less of a stink over the small raise for military then folks would make over a larger cost projection overall.

dutch508

Maybe the rest of you retards don’t remember living through all eight years of Clinton. I do. I remember seeing our pay raises fuqued with every year to score political points. I remember only being able to move the tanks once a week and then just to ‘exercise’ the track. I remember doing Platoon maneuver ex in golf carts.

Yeah…I remember the last democratic president very well.

I remember when I came in a Reagan was the boss. We were rebuilding the Army. Then with Bush No 41 we fine tuned it to beat the gawddammed ruskies- and fortunatly didn’t mothball it before we fought Desert Storm…and then DID mothball it soon after.

With ol’ Billy, we scraped and begged for ever part. We were lucky we weren’t fighting a war then, like we are now.

Now- we got a president who doesn’t belive we are fighting a war, doesn’t like the military and blames us for everything. Tomorrow night he’ll have a wounded soldier in the room as a prop during a speach where he’ll lie and tell us how good everyhting is and how hard he is fighting for us.

Yeah…that and I got a box of grid squares I’ll sell you, cheap.

Cdat (Retired)

I didn’t join the Army for the pay. I earned my own way. I didn’t need handouts.

Matt

The “One” will find a way to blame the ridiculously low pay raise on President Bush. I too remember the Army of Presidents Reagan,GHWB, and Clinton. I was sitting in Germany when President Bush was elected in 2001. There was a collective sigh of relief from the troops. We were almost giddy with anticipation about the money that would flow after his election. But it will take alot longer than the 8 yrs of love President Bush gave us to undo the damage 8 yrs of neglect lumped on us by Clinton. The myriad of programs canceled/scaled back by the “one” (FCS, Firescout, MULLE, etc.) while not a death blow, will delay the improvement of our forces even further. The stagnation is already setting in. My unit still does not have a budget and we are already in the 2Qof the FY. WTF, Barry O?

OldTrooper

Hey Dutch; how much you want for those grid squares? I have 3ft. of flight line and a bucket of rotor wash I’ll trade ya. I might even be able to throw in a cup of squelch (I’m working that deal with someone else, but should have it wrapped up today).

fm2176

I didn’t join the Army for the pay either, but midway through my career with a family to support and bills to pay, I can’t say a steady paycheck (and annual raises) are unwelcome. Being stuck in USAREC right now, I’ve watched the recruiting budget get slashed, from bonuses to advertising. A year ago, being the new guy at the station, I was humored by my co-worker’s fascination with the new President. We had one female who would have a speech on daily instead of doing her job. Everyone loved having “their” new Commander-in-Chief and getting rid of Bush. Funny thing is, I rarely hear about the President at work anymore.

trackback

[…] Smaller payraise for troops? A few weeks ago I wrote that retired military checks got smaller this year compared to last year, despite the fact that our costs of living had risen – 2.7% the last six months of 2009 according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Well, now it’s time for the active duty to shoulder their part of the White House budget, too, according to Stars & Stripes; […]

Jesse

First of all, the CPI rose 2.7% over the last 12 months (I believe you said “in the last 6 months of 2009.” In case you’re curious, seasonally adjusted CPI rose 2.1% in the last two quarters. Second, CPI rose .1% in 2008. The difference was due to volatility in the energy and food indexes. There’s a reason that they have a statistic for all items less energy and food. The point is, no employer is tied to the CPI. If anything, the military should be more concerned with keeping salaries consistent with corporate America. Now, a question for all you Joe Stiglitz proteges out there… What happens in a period of deflation? Do we cut military wages? Obviously not – wages are an example of something that is “downward sticky.” Basically, short run differences between wages and inflation are observable, but they average out of the long run. Stop using deception to criticize Obama.

TSO

I think you are missing a crucial point here Jesse. The military salaries are not consistent with civilian ones, as shown by repeated studies. However, the Congress can’t afford to bring to parity all at once, so the decision was made to up at a rate above inflation until parity was reached. Say like 2% above inflation. They have stuck to that until now. But again, this won’t happen anyway, because Congress will bump it.

Jesse

TSO – I’ll buy that, and I think that’s how it should be. My beef was with the mechanics and numbers used in the article.