Obama Pulls Combat Pay

Marty · Post by **Marty** » Sat Feb 04, 2012 4:50 pm

http://shark-tank.net/2012/02/04/25210/

http://www.military.com/benefits/conten ... r-pay.html

A real POS!

Grumpy · Post by **Grumpy** » Sun Feb 05, 2012 10:15 am

The instant they step off the plane and touch foreign soil, combat pay should apply.

From their own rules on combat pay, seems straight forward.

On duty in a foreign area in which he was subject to the threat of physical harm or imminent danger on the basis of civil insurrection, civil war, terrorism, or wartime conditions.

This would describe being deployed anywhere in the world where there is a Muslim population.

Rod Martin · Post by **Rod Martin** » Sun Feb 05, 2012 10:30 am

how about congress only gets payed for time on the floor voting on a bill

Greg_Cornish · Post by **Greg_Cornish** » Mon Feb 06, 2012 3:32 pm

Grumpy wrote:The instant they step off the plane and touch foreign soil, combat pay should apply.

So they should get combat pay for serving in Germany, England, Italy and Spain? I rather see them save it and spend it on VA Hospitals. I should have gotten combat pay while in AK. All I got was overseas pay.

Here's a good friend of mine being threatened by scary ole Muslims i an Arabic country.

Grumpy · Post by **Grumpy** » Mon Feb 06, 2012 6:05 pm

They are underpaid for what they do and the training required to do their jobs, compare their pay to the Federal employee doing janitor work or any other of a number of jobs govt. workers do that anyone could perform with a couple weeks training. Military is high tech now requiring high levels of training as opposed to paper pushers we pay two and three times more with little skill involved.

Greg_Cornish · Post by **Greg_Cornish** » Mon Feb 06, 2012 10:30 pm

I agree they are all under payed but that would up the price of war even more, huh?

Grumpy · Post by **Grumpy** » Tue Feb 07, 2012 9:28 am

Get rid of the bloat we are paying for now, give it to people who actually earn and deserve it.

Greg_Cornish · Post by **Greg_Cornish** » Tue Feb 07, 2012 1:52 pm

Vets will probably better understand the American Indians now as things Americans promised them for after care are steadily eroded.

Marty · Post by **Marty** » Wed Feb 08, 2012 12:53 pm

Greg_Cornish wrote:Vets will probably better understand the American Indians now as things Americans promised them for after care are steadily eroded.

I lived next to an Indian reservation when I was a kid in New Mexico and I don’t feel sorry for them. You are using Indians as a political ploy. As for giving more to the VA, I say close them down – there are only for people like you - I bet you are getting your disability look at as a VA disability when it did not happen in the military. The real vets that were wounded can go to a military base or go on TRICARE like I do.

Serve Longer – Pay More
On Thursday, Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta confirmed our fears when he released details on just how significant the defense cuts will be regarding the soon to be released FY2013 President’s budget.
The Pentagon’s FY2013 base budget request of $525 billion is a $6 billion dollar reduction compared to that of the FY2012 base budget, but the impact over the next five years reduces defense spending by $259 billion.

The impact of the cuts to military members and retirees runs deep.
The Pentagon’s reduction plan includes significant cuts to Army and Marine Corps end strength. The Army end strength will be cut by 80K from their peak of 570K leaving the Army with 490K. Marine Corps end strength will be reduced by 20K resulting in a final end strength of 182K.

Under the plan active duty pay raises will keep pace with private sector pay growth in 2013 and 2014, but starting 2015, military pay raises will be “limited” below that of private sector growth. Exactly how limited remains to be seen.

Retiree health care benefits takes a significant hit – most affected will be working age retirees under age 65. DoD’s proposed changes include:

1. New enrollment fees and additional fee increases for retirees under age 65 enrolled in TRICARE by creating a ‘tiered” approach based on retired rank. This means-testing will require senior grade retirees to pay more for their health care than junior retirees;
2. An enrollment fee for TRICARE for Life beneficiaries 65 and older; and,
3. Additional increases in pharmacy co-pays with the goal of increasing the use of generics and the mail order pharmacy.

The “tiered” approach to health care fees would make military retirees the only group of government retirees subject to healthcare means-testing. This is a concept we’ve fought ardently because it flies in the face of logic for a military service incentive – basically, the longer and more successfully you serve, the less benefit you earn.

The proposal doesn’t include any changes to retirement pay, but DoD will ask Congress to establish a BRAC-like commission with authority to conduct a review of the military retirement system. DoD reiterated that any changes resulting from the study would only affect future recruits.
Finally, as part of the Pentagon’s plan, the President will request from Congress another round of Base Realignment and Closures in order to reduce excess infrastructure. More base closures would lead to fewer quality of life programs and services such as exchanges, commissaries, and Military Treatment Facilities and clinics.

The Pentagon’s plan is far from final…it still needs to go through the various committees in both chambers in Congress, but in the current budget environment we definitely have our work cut out for us.
Now we have to wait for details on exactly how steep the health care fee hikes will be. These should emerge once the President releases his budget on February 13.

This proposal will set our legislative agenda for the foreseeable future. Please send your legislators a MOAA-suggested message and ask them to oppose these dramatic cuts.

http://www.moaa.org/Main_Menu/Take_Acti ... 2.html#Pay