No more "do your 20 and retire". The Feds will pay into a 401(K) and then when a service member leaves, they have to wait until they are 62 to collect.
Which means that after getting shot at for X number of years and then leaving, good luck to you. Maybe your 401(K) won't be wiped out in the markets.
I suspect that this will end up decimating the ranks of senior people, for why stay for 20 years and then have to find a job with nothing to fall back on? You can do a hitch or two and get out in your late 20s or early 30s with far better prospects of finding a job. There will be little incentive to make a career of it.
(I heard rumint about this a few months ago, but I didn't fully trust my source.)
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No need to worry about senior officers. From O-6 up they would be covered by a Supplemental Employee Retirement Plan (SERP) that would cover any gaps in their retirement. Just like in the corporate world.
but if you were a Koch brother or some other billionaire the congress will be right there for you
That is so f***Ed up, I can't even begin to describe it....
Did this get past a Democratic president? It's so typical of the "support our troops" crowd to slash benefits to the troops. Those 401(k)s won't have to be paid out to young soldiers who die homeless before 'retirement.'
I'm surprised they didn't create a "pension." A "pension," as opposed to the obsolete concept of a retirement fund, is a pool of money taken from workers that will be raided by a small number of very rich people when they just fucking want to take it. No cost. No complications. No trouble from anyone that matters.
Gee, what fun. Three-card Monte with your retirement. That's what my 401K turned out to be. I figured if I did my job well, I'd be taken care of. I was, just like the clown that sits atop that chair with the target on the drop mechanism above the water tank. Oh, Gee this is fun! Let's soak the sorry bassid again
One of two things will happen: a) the military will have to throw a *lot* more money at lifers to keep them in the military (there goes the supposed cost savings!), or b) the lifers will all leave, and with them will go the institutional memory of the military that makes it an effective tool for killing America's enemies, thereby destroying the military by turning it into a clueless rabble of short-timers. All for the short-term profit of defense contractors selling the government fighter jets that can't fly and combat ships that can't fight. SIgh. WASF.
- Badtux the Waddling Penguin
That is just Wrong. With a side order of Wrongness covered in Wrong sauce.
Damn, I'm sure there is some a-hole here in Canada thinking that is some swell idea. Glad I got out at 19 and have been drawing my pension since '95....Allan
Just like when the Cicil Service did away with CSRS and switched to FERS, which is basically a 401k retirement plan. Saves the Govt. a bunch of money and screws the workers/soldiers. However, we have way too many senior officers in our military and the Pentagon, the military pensions will break us eventually, so we do need to do something, I do think we need to thin out the ranks a bit....and this might just do it? Gotta love those unintended consequences!
Brenda, the problem is that we won't lose admirals, generals and colonels. We'll lose senior sergeants and chief petty officers, the men and women who have the technical skill to keep shit working and the ability to lead/train junior people.
They'll get out, go to work for the defense logistics contractors, and come back to work in civilian clothes for four times the money. The main reason thy stay, now, is the 20 year retirement.
If we can't afford to pay retirement benefits for the force we have, then we need to reduce it. Cheaping out with this 401(K) bullshit is the wrong thing to do.
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