Congress needs to clean up its house from top to bottom. When you mess with military retirement, something has to be done. Thoughts?

SGT Chris Quesenberry — Fri, 24 Apr 2015 21:07:16 -0400

this needs to be addressed sooner rather than later. Before I return to active duty, I will plaster this issue all over social medias because it needs to be fixed. Messing with soldiers retirement pensions is just wrong. They earn that when they raise their right hand and serve our nation for 20+ years putting their life on the line for our country. For our country to take that for granted is too wrong.

Response by SSG (ret) William Martin made Apr 24 at 2015 9:08 PM

SSG (ret) William Martin — Fri, 24 Apr 2015 21:08:50 -0400

If you work for the VA and have anything to do with waiting lists, you can earn bonus money by faking successful waiting lists.

Response by Maj Private RallyPoint Member made Apr 24 at 2015 9:24 PM

Maj Private RallyPoint Member — Fri, 24 Apr 2015 21:24:21 -0400

The only reason I'm not too opposed to it is because people who join before it would take effect get grandfathered in, therefore those who join once it's in effect will know what they're getting. I'd say it's not good for recruiting to reduce incentive, but it's still a better retirement than you'll get pretty much anywhere else (for good reasons of course).

But should attention be elsewhere? Absolutely. Ops/maintenance take up way more of the defense budget than personnel. The F-35 costs more than $11B/year and keeps costing more, AND could never do what an A-10 can do. Social Security is a scam that's finally about to implode and costs more than the entire defense budget. Medicare also requires significantly more money than the DoD, nevermind that it only serves to continue inflating medical costs and protect the insurance-based payment system, masking the real costs from the users. I'm pretty damn sure there are better things than military retirements to cut, but I'm not entirely opposed to making our pensions more sustainable.