Are Soldiers paid enough to Live?

Yes. Remember, people are paid for the work they do/value they bring. NOT for the lifestyle choices they chose. &nbsp;The trick is to ensure that your lifestyle and your income have some (positive!) relationship to each other.&nbsp;<div><br></div><div>Comparing military pay to civilian pay (including benefits packages for both!), military stacks up quite well to civilian, especially on the lower end. HS Grad, no prior experience? Military is hands down better than what you will find on the civilian side. It changes a bit when your compare level of responsibility in given job - but you wouldn't get that early responsibility in the civilian side, so it's really a red herring.&nbsp;</div><div><br></div><div>Buying that bitchin' Camaro on credit, getting married, having multiple kids on a PFC's pay is a headspace &amp; timing error.&nbsp;</div><div><br></div><div>My civilian employer finds that they value me at $X/year, including benefits. If I get married (I am), it is STILL $X. If I have a kid, it is still $X. If I have 8 kids with 5 different partners, it's still $X. Nobody thinks the employer should pay me more because I did stupid things.&nbsp;</div>

The problem is that too many soldiers are living outside of their means. If done right, basic pay/bas/bah should be plenty to cover all the basic needs.

<p>I think the biggest monetary issues for the new military members is that they are making more money than they've ever had in the lives so far and have never been taught fiscal responsibility (it isn't something that's been taught too well - look at our members of our civilian government - they are even worse at it).&nbsp; Since the high schools aren't handling that teaching responsibility - then maybe the military needs to step up and teach our new members and include their spouses in it if they have one.&nbsp; This way they will have the proper tools to budget their finances responsibly and be more likely to stay out of financial crisis.</p><p>If people can learn to control their spending and decide what they 'really need' compared to what they 'want' - then they will be taking a big step towards their fiscally stable standard of living.&nbsp;</p><p>As for the military life in general - we do get a lot of benefits that the civilian side doesn't have, but of course it all depends on what's relevant to the individual.&nbsp; </p><p><br></p>