There has been an on-going discussion here on Moonhowlings.net about pensions and other retirement plans. Some people here are very much oppose to any plans that are from money in the public coffers. I asked the serious question if those who oppose plans like VRS, Federal Retirement Programs, etc also oppose military retirement. To date, no one has answered me.
Last Sunday, the New York Times featured a section on pensions entitled, In Budget Crisis, States Take Aim at Pension Costs.
Many states are acknowledging this year that they have promised pensions they cannot afford and are cutting once-sacrosanct benefits, to appease taxpayers and attack budget deficits.
Illinois raised its retirement age to 67, the highest of any state, and capped the salary on which public pensions are figured at $106,800 a year, indexed for inflation. Arizona, New York, Missouri and Mississippi will make people work more years to earn pensions. Virginia is requiring employees to pay into the state pension fund for the first time. New Jersey will not give anyone pension credit unless they work at least 32 hours a week.
“We can’t afford to deny reality or delay action any longer,” said Gov. Pat Quinn of Illinois, adding that his state’s pension cuts, enacted in March, will save some $300 million in the first year alone.
But there is a catch: Nearly all of the cuts so far apply only to workers not yet hired. Though heralded as breakthrough reforms by state officials, the cuts phase in so slowly they are unlikely to save the weakest funds and keep them from running out of money. Some new rules may even hasten the demise of the funds they were meant to protect.
Lawmakers wanted to avoid legal battles or fights with unions, whose members can be influential voters. So they are allowing most public workers across the country to keep building up their pensions at the same rate as ever. The tens of thousands of workers now on Illinois’s payrolls, for instance, will still get to retire at 60 — and some will as young as 55.
One striking exception is Colorado, which has imposed cuts on its current workers, not just future hires, and even on people who have already retired. The retirees have sued to block the reduction
Some of the states mentioned have really cushy pensions. Virginia’s pension, the VRS, is rather modest but livable. The rub with the VRS is that back in the early 80’s most individuals had their pension paid by the state or the locality. That happened in leiu of giving pay raises. (see the history of VRS)
The VRS is actually mandated by the Constitution of Virginia. The history also explains the following:
House Joint Resolution 392 of the 1993 General Assembly Session requested the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission (JLARC) to complete a comprehensive study of VRS. The study concluded:
- VRS should be established as an agency independent of the executive branch of Virginia government.
- The appointment of trustees should be a shared responsibility of the Governor and the General Assembly.
- The VRS trust funds should be established as independent trusts in the Constitution of Virginia.
- The structure of VRS advisory committees should be established in law.
- The General Assembly should designate a permanent legislative commission or committee to carry out continuing oversight of the retirement system.
This series of changes to the Virginia Constitution and the VRS enabling statutes occurred in 1995 and 1996. The Constitution of Virginia (Article X, Section 11) now requires the General Assembly to maintain “…a retirement system for State employees and employees of participating political subdivisions. The funds of the retirement system shall be deemed separate and independent trust funds, shall be segregated from all other funds of the Commonwealth, and shall be invested and administered solely in the interests of the members and beneficiaries thereof.” Today, this includes 237 state agencies, 249 counties, cities and towns, 183 special authorities and 145 school boards. As of June 30, 2009, VRS had nearly 347,000 active members and more than 141,000 retirees and beneficiaries.
Back to the military question: Do those who want to get rid of pensions and retirement for public servants also want to get rid of military retirement? Freedom is not only preserved by fighting our enemy. It is also peserved by knowing how to read and write, and by being able to walk your streets without being killed by domestic enemies we often call thugs. Freedom is knowing that we have first responders to keep us safe.
All are important members of society who deserve to have their pensions kept intact without meddling and without the proverbial hands in the cookie jar. After reading the above, I am not even sure what Virginia did was legal.
This is a complicated issue but one that does need to be addressed, and rather urgently.
The distinction about any retirement system is whether that system is truly a Trust Fund or not. In an honest Trust Fund, the beneficiary simply receives that which he contributed, with a return, and nothing more.
If beneficiaries receive more than what they and the employers contributed, then we have what’s called an “unfunded liability.” If left unchecked, unfunded liabilities can drive corporations and governments into insolvency. Social Security and Medicare are extraordinarily large unfunded liabilities.
Most corporations have done away with retirement plans that offer benefits in excess of individual contributions. The auto companies still do so because of agreements with labor unions. Some state and local governments still do so as well. I don’t know whether Virginia does or not.
Individuals, whether they’re military, federal, state, local or corporate retirees, should be entitled to receive what they have contributed towards their retirement over their lifetimes. Beyond what they have contributed, no one should be entitled to receive anything.
I disagree. The promise of a pension after long and honorable service is a recruitment tool which can often clinch the deal. If that is ever changed as Starryflights suggests, you had better be prepared to parse your program between certain job categories. You might be able to attract some to normal federal service in competition with the private sector; but you are going to have a much harder time attracting those whose jobs involve real risk if you show yourself to be cheap on the benefits side. The pension and other benefits swayed me in part in a choice of a career, even though I knew that such a career would entail multitudinous hours of unpaid overtime at less pay (then) than others going into the private sector and that I was taking a serious risk with my own life. Only five years separated my retirement from my son’s college graduation. He started in the private sector at a salary above my highest level ever, and my rank at retirement was the civilian equivalent of a full colonel.
To further complicate the military pension issue is the fact that active duty military time can add to VRS time. I will receive a VRS pesion soon (very modest)for 13 years of service with a VRS jurisdiction. Four of those years were for active military service.
I would say if you get rid of the pension system for the military, you will have to reinstitute the draft. Reasonably good salaries and benefits are big draws for the military. During my military career (1951-1990) my monthly base pay ranged from $75.00 a month to just over $5,000.00 a month. Various allowances add to this base pay, but it is the base pay that is used to determine retirement. Today a brand new recruit makes just over $1,300.00 a month in base pay. And remember that is for being on duty 24 hours a day, 7 days a week plus the opportunity to deploy to places where people want nothing better than to kill you or maim you for life–so called “life altering injuries.”
Although the rules have changed, for the most part military personnel don’t put actual cash into their retirement but they “pay” for their retirement with long hours, dangerous work and repeated family separations. They go to war when ordered to do so and they often lay down their lives for the fellow citizens. Law enforcement personnel and firefighters are the closest analogies to service in the military. These folks and military folks are the reason we enjoy the freedoms we have as Moon has mentioned.
My recommendation–don’t mess with their pensions. I would be remiss not to mention all those who perform other public services–those we often refer to as “bureaucrats.” They are teachers, office workers, laborers, maintenance crews, doctors, nurses and technicians who work in public institutions. Many pu t in long hours for so-so pay, they pay into their pension fund and they expect the government to keep its promise regarding a pension at the appropriate time. If governments wish to contine to hire highly qualified folks–don’t screw with their retirements either.
Defined benefit pensions are simply unaffordable any longer. Very few private sector companies have them any more, and those that do are legacy programs. Defined contribution pensions can be made to work as long as the company or government funding the pension actually makes good on their contributions. (Of course defined contribution pensions don’t give the retiree the assurance of retiring at a specific date with a guaranteed amount of money, which was the draw of defined benefit pensions.)
The unpleasant fact is that the post World War II workforce model of 18-20 years of childhood, 30 years working and 20+ years of retirement doesn’t work anymore. Retirement ages must increase and increase substantially. That’s not going to be popular and will cause some social upheaval, but it’s going to happen regardless of our wishes.
Again, don’t get me wrong. I’d love to have the ‘Greek hairdresser’ plan and retire at 50 with a full pension, but it’s just not affordable any longer. There aren’t going to be enough young workers to pay for the Boomers let alone the generation that comes after them. (And guest workers aren’t the answer either unless you are talking in the neighborhood of 40+ million guest workers, which would significantly depress wages and impoverish millions.)
This is all a part of the great deleveraging that the Western world is going through. It’s going to take decades and be painful for many, but it’s going to happen whether we like it or not. The days of living beyond our means, personally and nationally, are ending. The death of defined benefit pensions are just a small part of it.
All true. The problem with pensions is the same problem we have with public pay schedules — comparability. How does one value a pay grade for a job that is commercial and in the yellow pages – should be easy – right – but thiere is no connection. Instead, it is based on a system of politically driven entry salaries, steps, cost of living increases and seniority. Its all very “fair” as everyone is treated the same. Indeed many of the certification requirements of the private sector equivelent do no apply to public workers doing exactly the same thing. Full and open competitin for such work might help, but Congress and most states prohibit succh public-private competitions. The higher or more administratiive jobs in the public sector are even worse because the relationship to private sector jobs falls off even more – IMHO – both in terms of the work and the salaries. The Secretary of a federal agency makes roughtly $170,000 – in a CEO job worth millions in the private sector. Everyone under the Secretary is capped by that – and so are the pensions.
Pensions are earned – not given. They are a part of the compensation package. Military pensions for career folks need to be separated from the 1-2 enlistment folks – who get more in terms of training, travel and savings. The risk function is understood, not unlike a fireman or policeman and should not be a part of the pension equation.
I thought it was odd that people never brought up military personnel when grousing about federal, state and local retirement/pensions.
Who does pay for federal pensions now? How about military? I know it varies from state to state. Is there a split?
If we have to change, where should the change take place? Obviously new hires would have different rules. How about people with only 10 years in? Should they be treated differently than people who have 30 years into their retirement program?
Everything you ever wanted to know about military pensions is at the link below, but the short version is that they are defined benefit plans.
http://usmilitary.about.com/cs/generalpay/a/retirementpay.htm
Pensions for civilian Federal employees were defined benefit plans until 1987 when the CSRS (defined benefit) was phased out for new hires and replaced with FERS (defined contribution) So Federal civil employee pensions are in better shape than most states. (That’s not to say that we can afford them, but they are less unaffordable than the others.)
Most states that have switched to defined contribution have done so for new hires only. The problem is that many of the states either haven’t done it at all, or waited too long to do it, and can’t afford the benefits they have already committed themselves to. (New Jersey famously only funded 6% of it’s new pension obligations last year.)
So to answer your question, yes military pensions need to be reformed. (I would make an exception for disability pensions for soldiers and sailors injured on active duty.) They need to be moved to a defined contribution system and be delayed in their start date to when the person is elderly. (The concept of an able-bodied 40 year old receiving a pension has to go regardless of what they did in that 20 year career. Able-bodied veterans should enter the workforce upon discharge, and draw on their military retirement account in their late 60s or early 70s, like a 401(k) or 403(b).
As always, I wish we could be more generous with our benefits to veterans, but we just can’t afford it.
I could swear I’ve answered the above in a few previous threads but I concur with FA. I believe we need to phase out the military pension system and look at phasing out the non-active duty medical plan aside from injuries received on duty.
For example, a Navy PO I know got hurt while playing a softball game with some friends. He got weeks off duty and then restricted duty to heal up. Ok, I can buy that. But, if he gets a ‘service related medical disability’ for it; that’s crossing a line.
We should begin to move new recruits to a 401K-type instrument.
I suppose my hackles were raised with all the talk of state, local and federal workers being deprived of benefits and thinking about the number of retired military people I have worked with who started new careers at age 45.
The big joke is to double and triple dip by going into another govt. pension program. I think I agree with FA about delaying receiving this money at least until age 55 and not if you are already working and earning above a certain amount.
People who are disabled should get full amounts as well as our support whether retired military or cop or firefighter.
FA, will you please spell out the different benefits you have mentioned. I get confused and I doubt if I am the only one.
Marin, I disagree. 401k is rife with problems. It is totally subject to markets and also is a deferred plan. It is a wonderful incentive but should not totally replace retirement plans.
I don’t begrudge military pensions at all if a person has worked the regulation time. Perhaps that needs adjustment and perhaps the age a person begins to receive the pension should change. I also feel the same way about cops, firefighters, teachers and others like them.
People need to realize that VRS has not been ridden hard and put away wet like NJ’s program has been. It stood as a national model for years. It might need tweaking now because of financial down turns and local jurisdictions falling on hard times. What it doesn’t need is to be borrowed from by the state. It has been Constitutionally authorized and mandated.
If I were an eligible employee, I would prefer to put in an extra percent or so if that was what was needed to keep it going in the manner it has been going.
A defined benefit plan is the classic style pension. Social Security is a defined benefit plan. You get $x a month based on a formula that factors in age, time served, salary, etc. But you get $x a month, usually with COLA, no matter what.
A defined contribution plan is more like an IRA or 401(k). A certain amount is put into a retirement account for you each month. You have investment options that range from conservative (CDs) to moderate (government bonds. Yup, government bonds are now moderate risk investments) to risky (stocks) You cannot withdraw the money until you reach a certain age. (again like 401(k)s there are usually certain qualifying events that let you tap the fund early.)
The key difference is that the funder of the pension is not responsible for the performance of the pension. If you invest wisely and are lucky you could have a very large nest egg. If you invest poorly or are unlucky, you will have much less.
Another, very rare type of pension is to purchase an annuity that does have a defined benefit, but these are typically cost prohibitive except in the cases of golden parachutes. (The reason they are so expensive is the same reason why defined benefit pensions are going away.)
If you are receiving a pension, you absolutely want to have a defined benefit pension. Unless of course, the company funding your pension goes bankrupt and you are kicked into the PBGC (a government agency that takes over defaulted pensions) Then you typically get about a 40-60% cut in your pension.
There is risk in defined contribution pensions, but on average they fare better than defined benefit pensions when you factor in the risk of pension defaults. (Even when you factor in the poor performance of the markets in the past ten years) One of the better tools that has come out in the past few years to help people manage their 401(k) or defined contribution pensions are target retirement funds. These funds are designed to automatically move your investments to minimize risk as you get closer to your intended retirement age. It helps avoid the folly of greedy people who were 90% invested in stocks 5 years before retirement.
I haven’t made any negative comments about VRS. I haven’t looked into it in much detail, but I understand that it is generally in better shape than most state pension plans. That doesn’t mean that it won’t eventually need to be switched to a defined contribution plan, just that the need is not as urgent as it is in other states. Mark my words: You will see at least one state attempt to default on their pension obligations within the next 5 years. It is very unclear what will happen then since state government pensions are not protected by the PBGC.
We’ll save the discussion of the massive shortfall in PBGC funding and its multibillion dollar price tag for another time.
Thank you very much, FA, for the mini course. It is all very confusing and you have illuminated. The terms sound so much alike.
What is the PBGC funding so we know what we have to look forward to.
MH,
PBGC estimates that, measured on a termination basis, total underfunding in single-employer defined benefit plans that PBGC insures was approximately $225 billion as of December 31, 2006. Because of concerns about limitations with respect to the estimation process, PBGC is no longer publishing estimates of total underfunding in its Annual Management Report. However, PBGC will continue to publish Table S-47, “Various Estimates of Underfunding in PBGC-Insured Plans,” in its Pension Insurance Data Book where the limitations of the estimates can be appropriately described.
I looked into a few years ago when I was terminated from EDS (now HP) along with I think 10K~ employees and wanted to see what HP was going to do with the pension. When I saw the govt itself was underfunded I excluded that pension from my ‘retirement plan’. I figure that money won’t exist.
Did you contribute or was it totally employer funded?
Employer funded.
5 years of service at my age and salary would get me about $800/month once I retired with the number increasing or decreasing if I defined the payout differently – life gets me a smaller per month or a 10Y plan gets me almost triple.
I’m not sure how the tax situation would work out (I’d need to talk to my brother in law or sister) but my guess is I could collection HP pension + social security + 401K + savings = sitting on my front yard in my tighty whiteys with a shotgun screaming at kids to stay off my lawn and not having to worry about money — unless the govt wants it.
That actually gives you a lot of options and is more like an annuity isn’t it? 800 a month as an add on is a pretty decent piece of chump change.
You pay taxes on pensions and on 401ks you generally pay 24% in taxes. In other words, just assume that you only own 75% of what your 401k account says you owe.
If you don’t like that idea, set up a Roth now to help offset it.
I had this big fantasy that I could roll over 401k into Roth and pay taxes ….nahhhh..that’s all it was…a fantasy.
Yah, I’m not complaining about the pension benefit but I’m also not counting on it. 🙂
I guess my question is more of.. if I’m getting a pension + 401K + savings + social security is my social security DECREASED because I have supplimental income and/or how is all that retirement money taxed (under current tax law recognizing that the NWO Administration will change it).
Honestly, I’m 30+ years from retirement and have not put much thought into it. Sides, maintaining current public pension obligations into the future will just mean that the US will default on all its obligations, we’ll slip into civil or world war and assuming I survive it (the saving) would’ve been a useless excercise anyways.
GO GREECE!
Presently is SS not income or means based. It might be by the time you get to it though, if you are in your 30’s.
marinm,
I wouldn’t count on Social Security to cover much more than a good lunch once a month by the time you retire. My guess is that they will solve the current mess through a mix of tax increases, means testing and COLAs that underperform CPI. You’ll still get a SS check each month because the day they genuinely stop paying everybody something is the day Social Security moves from a pension program to a welfare program, which makes it very vulnerable politically.
The good news is that you seem to have some good common sense when it comes to financial matters. If you are putting 10% or more of your salary into 401(k) or IRAs, you should do OK in the long run. Sadly, your generation is going to get screwed over in general, but at least you’ll be less screwed than your peers. Over time, as your income rises, try to max out your 401(k) contribution each year. One good tip is to increase your contribution by 1% of income every time you get a raise. (ie. if you get a 5% raise, make it a 4% effective raise by putting the extra 1% in your 401(k).) It’ll take a few years to get there, but with some planning most people in the middle class can get close to the $16.5k limit each year.
But again the good news is that you are already invested at your age. I once made a 35 year old man cry when I showed him how much money he had left on the table by waiting until then to open up a 401(k).
Agreed in terms of social security.. I’m seeing it as a ‘nice to have’ but not counting that it’ll be solvent when I retire.
I’m thinking about switching companies at present.. I love my job and commute but I’ve exhausted medical benefits here and don’t desire dipping into savings/retirement so a job switch may be in the cards. Will miss the Marines here. Did some research to find another company that offers the medical benefits I need and still doing the stuff I’m trained on and love to do.
FA, what do you think about the English emergengy budget and the move to become cash positive in 5 years? Good start? Too much of the axe? Not enough help to corporations?
How much attention should the Americas pay to those measures and should we follow?
History is repeating itself.
My husband has a pension, the employess who qualifed for it when it was still being offered, call it the golden parachute. Pensions were meant to help retain qualified knowledgable people. It isn’t JUST about money one puts in it, its about an agreement between employer and employee. People could leave and make more money annually, but they choose to stay because the pay off is a pension at the end of their employment.
I never saw a teacher, police officer, firefighter living in the lap of luxury or driving around an expensive mercedes benz. Their salaries are not exactly upper middles class income. These public servants DESERVE a cushion, its WELL freakin’ earned.
I hate to jump into this again, but feel I have to since I am a retired military person. I am presumeing that the folks who want to change the military retirement system have never served in the military or never served long enough to qualify for retirement. I am not sure if people think all veterans get some sort of retirement, but they don’t. As the link FA provided points out, those who serve less time than that required for retirement may apply to the VA for disability if they believe and can prove they have a service connected disability–the Agent Orange civtims are a good example. As to double dipping or triple or whatever, why should someone be penalized for retiring from one government job and then working at some other government job and receiving retirement from both. People in non-government jobs do it all the time and they are not penalized. As to retired military with VA disability retirements–if your VA disability is less than 40% your military retirement is reduced by the amount of your disability payment. If the disability is combat related this does not apply. For those with more than 40% disability, less of you disability payment is taken from your military retirement until at 100% you get both your military and your disability retirement. There are other amounts in between, but no necessary to discuss here.
But I want to go back to the military–if you never served or you served one tour and got out, then chances are you don’t have a clue as to what military personnel put up with for 20+ years in order to qualify for retirement. Chances are you don’t go on long deployments away from your family, you are not on call 24 hours a day, 365 days a year and even after you retire you are still subject to recall until age 60. You don’t hav eto go to places where people are trying to kill you and you don’t have to live under conditions that you wouldn’t subject your dog to. You don’t have to work on the flight line on an aircraft carrier, which is considered to be perhaps the most dangerous job in the world. So until you have walked a mile or even a block in the shoes of a service member, please don’t tell us what should be done to our retirement system. We’ve got enough problems as it is.
George, we pay for that system — that gives us a voice in how we decide to fund it. The military is under the civil authority and the People form that authority.
I dare say that the Commander in Afghanistan learned that lesson well today.
Interesting article from The Nation about the attempt by the right to initiate this whole idea that “public sector employees are bad”.
http://www.thenation.com/article/war-public-workers
b
Yep. We pay for that system. And its worth every penny. And we’ve decided that one of the perks for asking people to put their lives on the line, for signing a blank check that says “up to and including my life” to the US, is a retirement system that pays such benefits. Its a recruiting tool. In fact, enough reservists have now served that I believe that every day of active duty, not counting the 2 week duty, served by a reservist, should count backwards from the pay date for Reserve retirement pay, which starts at 60 years old. That actually comes out about right for 20 years retirees getting paid immediately. Reservists that have 15 years service could get paid at 55, etc. Yes, tweaking is needed, but its workable.
I am a citizen of the United States of America.
Those words, and the Constitution that defines their meaning give me the right to engage in political discourse on any subject, including military pensions. I do not live in 19th Century Prussia, where my rights are governed by my military service, and quite frankly Mr. Harris, I am sick of you telling me what topics are off limits for discussion. This is the third time in a week you’ve taken it upon yourself to decide who gets to participate in political discourse or deem certain opinions outside the realm of discussion.
Civilian authority over the military has a long history in this country, including the subject of military pensions. I gather from your post that you feel Congress was out of line in ordering the removal of the Bonus Army? Well, you and your Bonus Army of One are far worse.
Moon-howler specifically asked people to voice their opinions on military pensions in this thread. For you to come in and place your “Verterans Only” gag on the topic is wholely incompatible with the stated purpose of this forum which is “A place for civil debate”.
If you want to criticize my position on this economic matter (and yes, military pensions are first and foremost an economic matter) by all means do so. That is your right as an American. But that is not your way. Judging by this thread and your thread on immigration, you do not want to engage in debate or discussion. In your view, certain opinions, like the possibility of reforming military pensions, are forbidden except to those that share your beliefs or meet your qualifications.
Quite frankly, I’m about ready to leave this forum permanently. I have tried to provide reasonable, considered discussion on areas that I have a reasonable amount of experience in, particularly macroeconomics. I have never questioned the qualifications of anyone who criticized my opinions, and have only made suggestions on areas in which they may want to learn more. I even go out of my way to make it clear that I am discussing things that I believe will happen, not what I want to happen.
Yet every time I step on someone’s sacred cow, I get attacked. Not for the merits of my argument, but because I’m “a Republican Operative”, “not a Real Virginian” and now not a veteran. I’m sick of playing Cassandra here. If my views are unwelcome, I’ll be happy to move on. But you know what the one attack that nobody here has made against me is? “You said X would happen and you were wrong.”
I hope you save a copy of my post that I was unqualified to make . And in 10 years, when there have been significant changes to military pensions much along the lines I stated in my post, I hope you pull it out and read it. I at least hope then that you’ll admit to yourself that maybe, just maybe, I knew what I was talking about.
Good article, Bruce.
I’m reminded of Cargosquid’s “look, look, it’s a squirrel!” It’s a diversionary attempt to divide and conquer and keep the peons from looking at real issues. Suddenly public servants and their benefits are ripe for criticism. Where were these voices when the average private sector employee was wallowing in dough? Were they demanding that public emloyees’ salaries remain competitive. Hell, no.
Is there any group short of old white males that Republicans don’t hate?
Look! A squirrel! Censored, until that last sentence, you had a good point. And then you had to go and ruin it with an ad hominem attack.
Most Republicans totally support existing pension funds. The problem is that the public sector unions are demanding that the states cover THEIR malfeasance in underfunding pensions. The problem is that many public workers, mostly in other states, are demanding that budget cuts not affect them. Why should there be voices demanding that that public employee salaries be competitive with private sector? One gets into business or public sector know the pros and cons. I happen to feel that pensions are fine for public servants. That’s part of the contract that was agreed upon. Better benefits are part of the recruiting tool. However, like the private sector, those pensions are subject to the availability of funds, and unlike the feds, states cannot print money. Therefore, criticism of pensions is actually criticism against those demanding that everything stay funded when the tax base is collapsing.
Public servants are always subject to criticism because its our money that pays the salaries and pensions. Oh, and I don’t know about you, but the average private sector employee has NEVER “wallowed” in dough. Their salaries have been flat for years.
I also am a citizen of this Nation, I pay taxes (Income tax personal property, property, sales, social security and Medicare) just like everyone else so I guess I have helped fund those defined benefit reitrements for some public servants, I vote, I did serve in the military (what I call the post graduate course in cfitizenship–many man disagree) and I think I have a fair grasp of the consequences of messing around with military pay and retirement. We now have an all volunteer force and that demands a whole different view towards pay, benefits and retirement. If you want to curtail pay, reduce benefits including retirement, then you need to bring back the draft or keep the unemployment rate where it is (wonderful recruiting tool).
I am reminded of the bumper sticker that says: “If you can read this, thank a teacher. If you can read this in English, thank a soldier.” Still works for me.