(spin off of another thread)

HOw much should a soldier get paid?

How much is their life worth?

Give me a number.


ETA: Feel free to break this out into a general discussion of compensation for Hollyweirdos, sports stars, garbage men and teachers as well.

That is something you can't put a $ figure on.

A hell of a lot more than they are getting paid now. The salaries for pro ball players and military should be reversed. Guys playing a freaking game get millions and the guys putting their lives on the line get peanuts, it's sick.

A hell of alot more than they currently make.

$250,000 a year with full salary and life time benefits for their spouse/children in the event of death in the line of duty.

I propose we pay for this by instituting a 95% tax on all those you make their living in the entertainment feild. (Actors, Musicians, Directors)

Well, in a free market, the soldiers determine their pay, just like any other job.  If you have a shortage of qualified soldiers, you're not paying enough.  If you have lines out the recruiting office door and don't need very many soldiers, you're overpaying.

That's a simplified view, but that's pretty much it in a nutshell.

Enough to keep them.
Not enough to lose them.

More than they make now, but not too much. Why do I say that? Because if it was so lucrative that a lot more people (hey if a Private made $50k starting out I would have joined one of the armed services!) joined, we'd be living in a militocracy (is that a word?) and that, friends, is scary.

I'm way out on a limb here.

Quoted: $250,000 a year with full salary and life time benefits for their spouse/children in the event of death in the line of duty. I propose we pay for this by instituting a 95% tax on all those you make their living in the entertainment feild. (Actors, Musicians, Directors)

OK, we got a palya  

Three questions then -

1. YOu say $250,000, I say $10,000,000. We ARE talking about a life here. Who is right?

2. Why would their just compensation NOT be what they signed on the dotted line for? You know, the commitment they made in writing?

3. Since we agree the $$$ in #2 ain't much, why don't  we pony up individually and give them more  - NOT out of the gov't.?

I think itd be nice to see a small pay raise across the payscale, but its not that big of a deal - I'm planning on going at the current rate.

Quoted: Well, in a free market, the soldiers determine their pay, just like any other job.  If you have a shortage of qualified soldiers, you're not paying enough.  If you have lines out the recruiting office door and don't need very many soldiers, you're overpaying. That's a simplified view, but that's pretty much it in a nutshell.

+1

Quoted: I think itd be nice to see a small pay raise across the payscale, but its not that big of a deal - I'm planning on going at the current rate.

Thank you for serving.

YOu can't deposit that in the bank, but its heart felt.

People serve their country for reasons other than money, such as selfless service, patriotism, duty, honor, etc.  

Having said that, the enlisted men with families desperately need more money.

Quoted: $250,000 a year with full salary and life time benefits for their spouse/children in the event of death in the line of duty. I propose we pay for this by instituting a 95% tax on all those you make their living in the entertainment feild. (Actors, Musicians, Directors)

Go back to Cuba.
This is a free market society - while I agree with you that it is both obscene and immoral how much entertainers are paid, don't forget that it is YOU who is paying their society.

As for how much soldiers should be paid....I am going into law enforcement after graduation next may.
As a starting LEO, I realize I won't be making that much - but like my old man, 30 years as an LEO, told me, it is all about the pension.
The reason all .gov employees get paid little compared to the free market is because of the huge pensions involved.

Also, some more food for thought - could on consider the money spent on Abrams tanks, arguably one of the worlds most survivable vehicles, as money being paid to the soldier himself?
How much does an Abrams cost? An M16? Ammo? Body armor? Apaches?
All the things the soldier is provided for equipment could be seen as "deducted" from his paycheck.
Also don't forget free room, board, internet access, etc.
If you added it all up, soldiers would be making a pretty decent wage - the problem is that many try to live above their means. I have seen my .mil friends do it.

Just something to factor in.

Quoted: Having said that, the enlisted men with families desperately need more money.

Do soldiers deserve an across the board raise?  Yes, imo.

However, its boggling how many people willingly place themselves in a bad financial position.

Quoted: People serve their country for reasons other than money, such as selfless service, patriotism, duty, honor, etc.   Having said that, the enlisted men with families desperately need more money.

And smaller families.
New recruits are showing up with a wife and three kids in tow.
When I was stationed in Germany, they were tearing down the walls in quarters to make room for families with 9 kids.  Meanwhile, single enlisted soldiers were living in shitholes, four to a room.

OK,  Been in Done That.  That said,  Private E-1 should get $25 or so Dollars a hour for a 12 hour Day 6 Days a week. If any kind of deployment it should go up from there. Oh and all the Benefits to. I don't know what a good Captain should make but I would say something like a C.E.O
Just my thoughts
                                   tucker

Quoted: Quoted: Having said that, the enlisted men with families desperately need more money. Do soldiers deserve an across the board raise?  Yes, imo. However, its boggling how many people willingly place themselves in a bad financial position.

Exactly.
Where do you think the saying "If the Corps/Navy/Army wanted you to have a wife, we'd have issued you one."

For a single man, with all of the things the .mil provides for you (3 hots and a cot, etc) you are pretty well off compared to most.
Don't spend all your money on beer and tatoos, don't get any of the local chicks pregnant, and you can sit back and watch your nest egg grow.

Enough for me to afford an EDM Windrunner fifty cal.  That would kick butt.

enough to keep the service members  family off of food stamps.

edit to add:
they should make comparable to the civilan world for the job they are doing.

You cant put a number on ones life . . . I do think that people that throw a ball around a couty get paid way to damn much

I think they should be making more than what they are making . . . .

I get paid adaquately. I don't need to pay for a house, or (most) utilities. (Pay my own cell, Lima-Lima, and internet.) I still pay for my own food. (MPs get seperate rats cause shift work means you dont eat when the D-FACs open.) But, I survive on 1200 a month. Its not a lavish living, but I still manage to blow most my spending cash on mil gear. (Better than issue.)

And I'm only a PV2. Its not enough to own a new car, maybe a hoopdie. (Like a 500 dollar car.) I dont currently own one though. (deploying soon....Im gonna save up a bunch and get me a new truck when I get home after a year.)

John

Quoted: Benefits

Such as.... Which ones?

What is the pay scale nowadays?

Personally i think they have it extremly well now.  They live better than alot of civies.  Out here they all drive brand new cars.  Nobody made them serve, it's all voluntary.

They get paid
They get housing allowance on top of that.  My boss dont give me extra money to live somewhere.  I have to make due with my salary.
No taxes on purchases for food, gas and items from the exchange and those items are usually cheaper than outside the base.
30 days a year vacation
Complete free medical for them and family members.
Discounts on mortgage loans, movies, cars, travel and almost anything else.
Collect retirement when they retire.  I don't get mine til i'm 60 something.
Free trainning, schooling, GI Bill
Re-enlistment bonus that can be thousands of dollars

Overall i think they have it pretty damn good.  
There is a guy out here that hunts with me.  He's an officer in the navy.  He gets like $3,000 a month for housing allowance.  That is on top of his salary.  That is just nuts.  The landlords and rental companies out here know it too.  They know how much the mil guys get so they keep all the rents high and then local people suffer.

I am all for the military and have high respect for all that serve.  But i do think they have it made nowdays.

Whatever he gets paid, let the guys drink. 18 and old enough to die but not enjoy a good scotch.

Quoted: Exactly. Where do you think the saying "If the Corps/Navy/Army wanted you to have a wife, we'd have issued you one." For a single man, with all of the things the .mil provides for you (3 hots and a cot, etc) you are pretty well off compared to most. Don't spend all your money on beer and tatoos, don't get any of the local chicks pregnant, and you can sit back and watch your nest egg grow.

Good luck enforcing that!    Though you are correct, this tradition is thousands of years old.  Its what Joes do.  Gotta love 'em.

This is what I get paid.
Taxable
Base pay 2060.00
Sub Pay   250.00

Non Taxable
Commuted Rations 267.00
Basic Allowance for Housing 904.00

currently not on sea duty but when I was that was an additional 380.00 per month

Quoted: You cant put a number on ones life . . . I do think that people that throw a ball around a couty get paid way to damn much

This is really where I wanted to go.

The ABILITY to pay a salary comes out of the revenue that person generates. ( If I have two sales people, and one sells $10,000 a month, and the other $100,000 a month, should I pay them equally?)

Is anyone gonna argue that your average school teacher generates more revenue than Derek Jeter (NY Yankees superstar)

So, shouldn't Jeter get an exponentially higher salary than Suzie School teacher?

Quoted: Whatever he gets paid, let the guys drink. 18 and old enough to die but not enjoy a good scotch.

q4t

Quoted: Well, in a free market, the soldiers determine their pay, just like any other job.  If you have a shortage of qualified soldiers, you're not paying enough.  If you have lines out the recruiting office door and don't need very many soldiers, you're overpaying. That's a simplified view, but that's pretty much it in a nutshell.

+1  Run it like a business.

Quoted: Whatever he gets paid, let the guys drink. 18 and old enough to die but not enjoy a good scotch.

Hence....why Im 20, and love Germany. My 21st birthday (which will be spent in Afghanistan) holds just as much savor as it would if I didn't drink...cause I finally am considered worthy of my second amendment rights in the eyes of the law. And...its all about straight vodka by the 10 shots.

John

Quoted: Quoted: Exactly. Where do you think the saying "If the Corps/Navy/Army wanted you to have a wife, we'd have issued you one." For a single man, with all of the things the .mil provides for you (3 hots and a cot, etc) you are pretty well off compared to most. Don't spend all your money on beer and tatoos, don't get any of the local chicks pregnant, and you can sit back and watch your nest egg grow. Good luck enforcing that!    Though you are correct, this tradition is thousands of years old.  Its what Joes do.  Gotta love 'em.

Never said it would be easy.

Net monthly pay after seventeen years of hellish toil:

$4100

If I were to move back to Southern California (housing allowance varies by geographic location):

$5100

While on deployment to Iraq:

$6000

Not too shabby, considering: non-existent medical bills for the family, lower cost groceries at the commisary, and occasional re-enlistment bonuses (I've been paid a total of $35,000 in reenlistment bonuses over my career).

The big ticket item for me, however, is receiving a retirement income when I am only 38.

Military pay sucked big time several years ago, but it has improved considerably since.

Quoted: Quoted: $250,000 a year with full salary and life time benefits for their spouse/children in the event of death in the line of duty. I propose we pay for this by instituting a 95% tax on all those you make their living in the entertainment feild. (Actors, Musicians, Directors) OK, we got a palya   Three questions then - 1. YOu say $250,000, I say $10,000,000. We ARE talking about a life here. Who is right? 2. Why would their just compensation NOT be what they signed on the dotted line for? You know, the commitment they made in writing? 3. Since we agree the $$$ in #2 ain't much, why don't  we pony up individually and give them more  - NOT out of the gov't.?

Because it is the government's military, not ours.

I guess Im still ideological young don't know shit private, but i don't fight for no damn politicans political advancement - I fight to make sure the shit thats going on over there will STAY over there. (Which "Over there" is only about a four hour flight from where I'm sitting now.)

Actually except obviously in a time of war, the most dangerous jobs belong to iron workers, firefighters, crab fishermen.  So make a soldiers pay equal to those jobs.  Same benefits and same insurance. The other guys can make $40-50 starting out.  Maybe not a firefighter but the crab guys do well and my iron worker bud makes a ton of money.

I think even an increase to $45-50k starting a year and you would have an endless line of recruits waiting to join.  

Quoted: About twice what a cop or firefighter gets. When you're working 114 hours a week and getting paid for about 30 something's wrong. You basically can't pay a military member their worth so they pay them a couple of bucks less than the minimum wage.

Paul, I need to you to go talk to my boss.

Quoted: I think even an increase to $45-50k starting a year and you would have an endless line of recruits waiting to join.

I don't want a bunch of profiteers in my military.

Cus people there for the money cut and run whenever the pay seems to be less than they think their life is worth.

Which is pretty much all the time.

I want idealogues. Money isn't worth dying for. Ideas are.

Quoted: As a starting LEO, I realize I won't be making that much - but like my old man, 30 years as an LEO, told me, it is all about the pension. The reason all .gov employees get paid little compared to the free market is because of the huge pensions involved.

Huge pension? What huge pension? Maybe in some parts of the country. Nowhere around here.

Quoted: $250,000 a year with full salary and life time benefits for their spouse/children in the event of death in the line of duty. I propose we pay for this by instituting a 95% tax on all those you make their living in the entertainment feild. (Actors, Musicians, Directors)

+1,000,000,000,000,000

Quoted: That is something you can't put a $ figure on.

+1.  

Quoted: Quoted: $250,000 a year with full salary and life time benefits for their spouse/children in the event of death in the line of duty. I propose we pay for this by instituting a 95% tax on all those you make their living in the entertainment feild. (Actors, Musicians, Directors) +1,000,000,000,000,000

Why only $250,000?

I  think you are a cheap bastage.

You think their life is worth ONLY $250K??

I'm a guard soldier. We get all of the fun duties, but very few of the benefits.
Local soldiers (Oregon) are deployed quite often.
The Army treats us like a temp labor pool.
No medical or dental (except when activated)
Space A only in CONUS.
We are not elligeable for most of the Army education programs.
Civ employers are in many cases getting leary of hiring us.
Why train someone who's going overseas for 18 months?
Why hire him in the first place?

Living wage pay. Make base pay for a soldier at least above the poverty line.
$25k base to start.
Make all benefits apply to all troops.
Midwinter

Quoted: Quoted: You cant put a number on ones life . . . I do think that people that throw a ball around a couty get paid way to damn much This is really where I wanted to go. The ABILITY to pay a salary comes out of the revenue that person generates. ( If I have two sales people, and one sells $10,000 a month, and the other $100,000 a month, should I pay them equally?) Is anyone gonna argue that your average school teacher generates more revenue than Derek Jeter (NY Yankees superstar) So, shouldn't Jeter get an exponentially higher salary than Suzie School teacher?

Okay, yes, the ABILITY to pay the salary comes from how much money whoever signs the paycheck has. Why? Not all jobs generate money. Like teachers and soldiers.

Lets look at an auto worker, I don't know the particulars but let's say some person makes $50 an hour building cars, and that same shop makes Ford Festiva's, and Ferrari Enzos. Let's say the Ford Festiva sells for $5,000, and the Enzo sells for $500,000. Now, granted, you can make a lot more Festivas for a smaller price than an Enzo, but you have to sell a lot more to make the same profit.

Let's say, just for shits and giggles, that each car takes 5 hours to put together, again I'm just making up numbers. So either car the guy has to build will earn him how much? $250.

Which generates more profit?

Some people get paid hourly, some people get paid by salary.


Now does a school teacher generate revenue? Not directly.

However, if a school teacher passes on knowledge and helps steer someone in the right course, to say, oh I don't know, some kid that invents some big computer thing that earns him all sorts of money, doesn't the teacher indirectly affect the generation of that revenue?

My point in the other thread wasn't that we should redirect money in a socialist way, but that sports stars and hollywood actors make a fuck of a lot of money for entertainment, while people that have an educational and protective value that allows us to keep paying our entertainment stars big money, don't make enough.

Now sure, they could have chosen to do something else, you're right, it's all about free will.

The free will to pay $9 for a movie ticket, $60 for a stadium seat, and $120 for a concert ticket, is the same free will that lets people choose which career will offer them the most money.

I don't think soldiers and teachers should get paid the same salary as Derek Jeter, although I wish they could because they deserve it, and THAT was my point. They DESERVE it. I know they'll never get it. You can toss around all sorts of economic stuff, that's fine, my minor is in Economics, I understand it, my point was that I FEEL that teachers and soldiers should make more than they do, and at the same time, entertainment stars make more than I FEEL they are worth. Does that make sense to you or are you going to call me a commie.

$25 a kill

His weight in pillaged gold.

The same number of concubines as he has fingers.

And all the alcohol he will ever need.

Quoted: Quoted: I think even an increase to $45-50k starting a year and you would have an endless line of recruits waiting to join.   I don't want a bunch of profiteers in my military. Cus people there for the money cut and run whenever the pay seems to be less than they think their life is worth. Which is pretty much all the time. I want idealogues. Money isn't worth dying for. Ideas are.

Yup; pay enough so you don't lose them to the civilian world, but lets not get carried away. I think things are pretty well, actually. The O's get comparable salaries with their civilian counterparts once all the benefits are counted; there are airline pilots getting paid less than an O-1 in flight school.

The E's could probably use a pay raise, especially given the hours they work. But even that's not terrible either for a single guy. I was getting E-1 convalescent pay for two months after NPQ'ing out of OCS, and with BAH for NYC it adds up to about as much as any job offer I've gotten yet as a college student.

Quoted: Quoted: $250,000 a year with full salary and life time benefits for their spouse/children in the event of death in the line of duty. I propose we pay for this by instituting a 95% tax on all those you make their living in the entertainment feild. (Actors, Musicians, Directors) +1,000,000,000,000,000

You see, there would be a problem with that, well sort of. If base pay for the military was 250,000 it would be the hottest job in the country, everyone would want to join. Since there is a fixed number of jobs available, only the absolute fittest could join. This would mean the average soldier would have an IQ of like 135, be an imaculate physical specimine, and have done years of pre-enlistment training to get the chance to join. This would mean that the vast majority of people couldn't serve no matter how much they wanted to, and tons of people would serve, even if they hated every minute of it. While our army might become more competant, it would completely change all of the ideals behind it. The vast majority of Arfcommer's (myself included) would never, ever, get the chance to join.

Quoted: $25 a kill

Hhhmmmm.....the incentive plan.

I Like It!!!!!!!!!!!!!  

After they secure the oil fields, they should get about 20% of the net profits from the oil sale divided amongst them.  They should also get 40 to 160 acres of the conquered land, and as much loot as they can carry.  (Muslim countries only)

Non valid question really.   Your question assumes that each soldier is signing up expecting to die. That is not the case at all. The odds of dying in the Military are still pretty low.    The ones that are actually KIA by enemy action should get 1,000,000 to the next of kin.