Can someone explain the wealthy military officer phenomenon?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Is the premise here that military retirees don’t deserve the pay and benefits they receive?

The military, like most civilian careers, has a benefit system that rewards sacrifices, hard work, and competence. Rank and pay are based on experience and education (shocking!).

So some military families actually find financial stability after a career in the military. Is that a bad thing? With few excerptions (there are always exceptions), that success is usually modest, yet comfortable at best.

Most of them did not have the privilege (oh no, did I appropriate your “p” word) of making their own decisions about where and when they moved, where and when they deployed, or whether their kids could remain in a school system that they were comfortable with. They didn’t have the privilege of buying a home in early 20s, and staying there to gain equity over 20 years, while their parents lived up the street and provided them with free daycare.

Clearly this crowd does not appreciate that there are sacrifices inherent to service. Now you’re complaining that the benefits that are designed to incentivize families to make those sacrifices (so your family doesn’t have to) are too much?

+1
I don't understand why DCUM begrudges them a comfortable retirement when similarly educated civilians expect this standard.
Regardless, what OP describes is completely out of the norm. Either they run with a crowd that has family money or dual salaries or they are just are just looking to be controversial.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:It’s because the taxpayer funds a huge portion of their expenses (housing while on base, no down payment for Va loans, the list goes on). Welfare queens to the max

+1. Even one of Reagan's hires (Stockdale, I think his name may be) wrote a book a few years ago describing the US military as socialistic. But if you dare question it, you're labeled a "communist" or worse. DH has several retired military in his family, and when they start bragging about their free health care and whatnot at Thanksgiving, I say "you're welcome."

Maybe when the conversation turns to the safe and free society we live in, your retired military family members can turn to you and say, “You’re welcome.”

Oh, they do, at every turn.

Good, I’m glad you are making sure to thank them for their service.

You are thanking them, right, and that’s why they’re saying, “You’re welcome”?

Thanking them for their service is cringe. They didn’t do it for you.

This.

The elephant in the room is that many people join or stay in the military because it is their best (financial ) option.

That is not politically correct but it is true. (That is why they use bonuses to get them to re-up, not flags or the constitution!)

Come on. That's not true. Of all the officers that got to retirement there isn't a single one I know that did it for a paycheck. Many easier careers that don't totally burn your family and regularly puts you at risk.

Yes, they did it for the pay check, retirement pay and health insurance. No one stays in past 8-10 years except for that. For us, it was the health insurance.

Sure, they stay until 20 for the benefits or you get out pretty quick. That said, all the ones I know actually care about the military and our country. It's not like "showing up" for a paycheck at a 9 to 5.

Yes it’s for the pay check. Yes, it’s the same.

Your non-military job can order you to deploy to a war zone? Your non-military job tells you where you are going to live? No, it's not the same.

Actually yes there are civilian jobs that deploy to war zones and my spouses job dictates where we live.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Straw man. Base officer housing might not be that nice (though why you brought up enlisted housing I have no idea), but BHA definitely is.

Married to an officer. We don’t have access to base housing. Many in the Bethesda area don’t.

This isn't true at all. You have access to base housing on other bases, but you choose to live in Bethesda. You can go to Ft. Mead, Andrews, Bolling, etc.

I actually can’t. Husband has to live within a certain radius of the hospital.

You can live where ever you want. The rule is for your husband, not you and you can live in a cheaper area and not just Bethesda.

Shut up. Even the military, for all its MANY faults, prefers to keep the servicemember with their civilian spouse. Hell, they try to keep dual military couples together.

You were blessed. We were separated two years because of it. Sure, it's nice to stay together but it's not realistic for everyone. Check your privilege but you were probably an officer family.

Um. Enlisted or not, the military never expected your husband to live within a certain radius of his place of employment and for you to not.

Actually, yes they did. We couldn't afford it, so I stayed behind. See how that works.

Troll. You can't "not afford" to move on accompanied orders.

No, we could not afford it. I had a good job and close to retirement. We needed my income till my husband could retire and get a job and start over working their way up which isn’t easy to do in your late 30s.

This really isn’t relevant and you’d think you’d know better than to tell someone just to live apart from their spouse because you chose not to. It’s not that you couldn’t afford it. It didn’t make financial sense.

No, we could not afford it as I did not have a job where he was going and we could not afford to live on just his salary. Enlisted don’t make that much.

Please stop. An E-7 currently makes around $65k a year, plus BAH, plus BAS, but whatever other incentive pay they're entitled to. E.g., enlisted aircrew AIP can be up to $600 a month.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Straw man. Base officer housing might not be that nice (though why you brought up enlisted housing I have no idea), but BHA definitely is.

Married to an officer. We don’t have access to base housing. Many in the Bethesda area don’t.

This isn't true at all. You have access to base housing on other bases, but you choose to live in Bethesda. You can go to Ft. Mead, Andrews, Bolling, etc.

I actually can’t. Husband has to live within a certain radius of the hospital.

But don’t they still give you lots of money towards your housing costs??

For officers yes, enlisted no and it depends on rank. If they can afford Bethesda they are higher ranking officer.

When I married my husband, he was an O-2. He would be getting $1600 a month for housing now based on our location then. How is that lots of money? He would have been getting the same as an E-6! (Because you're wrong, and enlisted DO get money toward housing. Please stop spouting off your ignorance.)

Your ignorance is showing. You have no clue about enlisted. It is a decent amount of money. You don’t have to live in Bethesda and most live in cheaper areas like us.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Straw man. Base officer housing might not be that nice (though why you brought up enlisted housing I have no idea), but BHA definitely is.

Married to an officer. We don’t have access to base housing. Many in the Bethesda area don’t.

This isn't true at all. You have access to base housing on other bases, but you choose to live in Bethesda. You can go to Ft. Mead, Andrews, Bolling, etc.

I actually can’t. Husband has to live within a certain radius of the hospital.

You can live where ever you want. The rule is for your husband, not you and you can live in a cheaper area and not just Bethesda.

Shut up. Even the military, for all its MANY faults, prefers to keep the servicemember with their civilian spouse. Hell, they try to keep dual military couples together.

You were blessed. We were separated two years because of it. Sure, it's nice to stay together but it's not realistic for everyone. Check your privilege but you were probably an officer family.

Um. Enlisted or not, the military never expected your husband to live within a certain radius of his place of employment and for you to not.

Actually, yes they did. We couldn't afford it, so I stayed behind. See how that works.

Troll. You can't "not afford" to move on accompanied orders.

No, we could not afford it. I had a good job and close to retirement. We needed my income till my husband could retire and get a job and start over working their way up which isn’t easy to do in your late 30s.

This really isn’t relevant and you’d think you’d know better than to tell someone just to live apart from their spouse because you chose not to. It’s not that you couldn’t afford it. It didn’t make financial sense.

No, we could not afford it as I did not have a job where he was going and we could not afford to live on just his salary. Enlisted don’t make that much.

Please stop. An E-7 currently makes around $65k a year, plus BAH, plus BAS, but whatever other incentive pay they're entitled to. E.g., enlisted aircrew AIP can be up to $600 a month.

Very few make it to e7 and my spouse did not. You think $65 is a lot of money? Can you live off that? So, no, we could not afford for me to give up my job.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Straw man. Base officer housing might not be that nice (though why you brought up enlisted housing I have no idea), but BHA definitely is.

Married to an officer. We don’t have access to base housing. Many in the Bethesda area don’t.

This isn't true at all. You have access to base housing on other bases, but you choose to live in Bethesda. You can go to Ft. Mead, Andrews, Bolling, etc.

I actually can’t. Husband has to live within a certain radius of the hospital.

You can live where ever you want. The rule is for your husband, not you and you can live in a cheaper area and not just Bethesda.

Shut up. Even the military, for all its MANY faults, prefers to keep the servicemember with their civilian spouse. Hell, they try to keep dual military couples together.

You were blessed. We were separated two years because of it. Sure, it's nice to stay together but it's not realistic for everyone. Check your privilege but you were probably an officer family.

Um. Enlisted or not, the military never expected your husband to live within a certain radius of his place of employment and for you to not.

Actually, yes they did. We couldn't afford it, so I stayed behind. See how that works.

Troll. You can't "not afford" to move on accompanied orders.

No, we could not afford it. I had a good job and close to retirement. We needed my income till my husband could retire and get a job and start over working their way up which isn’t easy to do in your late 30s.

So you chose to stay for financial reasons. It wasn't that you "couldn't afford" it. The military would have paid your relocation expenses and given your DH accompanied BAH.

No, we could not afford it. Relocation expenses were not the issue.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Is the premise here that military retirees don’t deserve the pay and benefits they receive?

The military, like most civilian careers, has a benefit system that rewards sacrifices, hard work, and competence. Rank and pay are based on experience and education (shocking!).

So some military families actually find financial stability after a career in the military. Is that a bad thing? With few excerptions (there are always exceptions), that success is usually modest, yet comfortable at best.

Most of them did not have the privilege (oh no, did I appropriate your “p” word) of making their own decisions about where and when they moved, where and when they deployed, or whether their kids could remain in a school system that they were comfortable with. They didn’t have the privilege of buying a home in early 20s, and staying there to gain equity over 20 years, while their parents lived up the street and provided them with free daycare.

Clearly this crowd does not appreciate that there are sacrifices inherent to service. Now you’re complaining that the benefits that are designed to incentivize families to make those sacrifices (so your family doesn’t have to) are too much?

It’s shocking the difference between officer and enlisted regular and retirement pay. Our retirement may barely covers groceries. No one is living off that.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Straw man. Base officer housing might not be that nice (though why you brought up enlisted housing I have no idea), but BHA definitely is.

Married to an officer. We don’t have access to base housing. Many in the Bethesda area don’t.

This isn't true at all. You have access to base housing on other bases, but you choose to live in Bethesda. You can go to Ft. Mead, Andrews, Bolling, etc.

I actually can’t. Husband has to live within a certain radius of the hospital.

You can live where ever you want. The rule is for your husband, not you and you can live in a cheaper area and not just Bethesda.

Shut up. Even the military, for all its MANY faults, prefers to keep the servicemember with their civilian spouse. Hell, they try to keep dual military couples together.

You were blessed. We were separated two years because of it. Sure, it's nice to stay together but it's not realistic for everyone. Check your privilege but you were probably an officer family.

Um. Enlisted or not, the military never expected your husband to live within a certain radius of his place of employment and for you to not.

Actually, yes they did. We couldn't afford it, so I stayed behind. See how that works.

Troll. You can't "not afford" to move on accompanied orders.

No, we could not afford it. I had a good job and close to retirement. We needed my income till my husband could retire and get a job and start over working their way up which isn’t easy to do in your late 30s.

So you chose to stay for financial reasons. It wasn't that you "couldn't afford" it. The military would have paid your relocation expenses and given your DH accompanied BAH.

No, we could not afford it. Relocation expenses were not the issue.

You chose not to. The military gave your spouse enough BAH to live in Bethesda, because a servicemember with financial issues is a security liability. You decided not to. I get it! We've had to lower our standard of living because BAH didn't go as far in one place as another. But I didn't pretend we "couldn't afford it."

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Straw man. Base officer housing might not be that nice (though why you brought up enlisted housing I have no idea), but BHA definitely is.

Married to an officer. We don’t have access to base housing. Many in the Bethesda area don’t.

This isn't true at all. You have access to base housing on other bases, but you choose to live in Bethesda. You can go to Ft. Mead, Andrews, Bolling, etc.

I actually can’t. Husband has to live within a certain radius of the hospital.

You can live where ever you want. The rule is for your husband, not you and you can live in a cheaper area and not just Bethesda.

Shut up. Even the military, for all its MANY faults, prefers to keep the servicemember with their civilian spouse. Hell, they try to keep dual military couples together.

You were blessed. We were separated two years because of it. Sure, it's nice to stay together but it's not realistic for everyone. Check your privilege but you were probably an officer family.

Um. Enlisted or not, the military never expected your husband to live within a certain radius of his place of employment and for you to not.

Actually, yes they did. We couldn't afford it, so I stayed behind. See how that works.

Troll. You can't "not afford" to move on accompanied orders.

No, we could not afford it. I had a good job and close to retirement. We needed my income till my husband could retire and get a job and start over working their way up which isn’t easy to do in your late 30s.

This really isn’t relevant and you’d think you’d know better than to tell someone just to live apart from their spouse because you chose not to. It’s not that you couldn’t afford it. It didn’t make financial sense.

No, we could not afford it as I did not have a job where he was going and we could not afford to live on just his salary. Enlisted don’t make that much.

Please stop. An E-7 currently makes around $65k a year, plus BAH, plus BAS, but whatever other incentive pay they're entitled to. E.g., enlisted aircrew AIP can be up to $600 a month.

Very few make it to e7 and my spouse did not. You think $65 is a lot of money? Can you live off that? So, no, we could not afford for me to give up my job.

What? Anyone who makes it to 20 years makes E-7. Are you in your early 20's? You sound like you might be, in which case you probably need to adjust your expectations regarding...life.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Straw man. Base officer housing might not be that nice (though why you brought up enlisted housing I have no idea), but BHA definitely is.

Married to an officer. We don’t have access to base housing. Many in the Bethesda area don’t.

This isn't true at all. You have access to base housing on other bases, but you choose to live in Bethesda. You can go to Ft. Mead, Andrews, Bolling, etc.

I actually can’t. Husband has to live within a certain radius of the hospital.

But don’t they still give you lots of money towards your housing costs??

For officers yes, enlisted no and it depends on rank. If they can afford Bethesda they are higher ranking officer.

I'm curious what the average DCUM thinks a lot of housing is for the Bethesda area?
For 2024, it's $4260/month for an O6 with dependents in Bethesda. Remember you move often so you don't have a lot of time to build up equity. That person took about 18 years to get to O6. I don't know anyone living large in Bethesda on that. The people we know that are able to live fairly close in are dual earners.
There is so much mis-information on this thread.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Straw man. Base officer housing might not be that nice (though why you brought up enlisted housing I have no idea), but BHA definitely is.

Married to an officer. We don’t have access to base housing. Many in the Bethesda area don’t.

This isn't true at all. You have access to base housing on other bases, but you choose to live in Bethesda. You can go to Ft. Mead, Andrews, Bolling, etc.

I actually can’t. Husband has to live within a certain radius of the hospital.

But don’t they still give you lots of money towards your housing costs??

For officers yes, enlisted no and it depends on rank. If they can afford Bethesda they are higher ranking officer.

When I married my husband, he was an O-2. He would be getting $1600 a month for housing now based on our location then. How is that lots of money? He would have been getting the same as an E-6! (Because you're wrong, and enlisted DO get money toward housing. Please stop spouting off your ignorance.)

Your ignorance is showing. You have no clue about enlisted. It is a decent amount of money. You don’t have to live in Bethesda and most live in cheaper areas like us.

You know these numbers are public, right? Here, I reduced the rank a bit.

E 5 with DEPENDENTS:
$ 2880.00
E 5 without DEPENDENTS:
$ 2538.00

But keep going about how you can't afford Bethesda.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Straw man. Base officer housing might not be that nice (though why you brought up enlisted housing I have no idea), but BHA definitely is.

Married to an officer. We don’t have access to base housing. Many in the Bethesda area don’t.

This isn't true at all. You have access to base housing on other bases, but you choose to live in Bethesda. You can go to Ft. Mead, Andrews, Bolling, etc.

I actually can’t. Husband has to live within a certain radius of the hospital.

You can live where ever you want. The rule is for your husband, not you and you can live in a cheaper area and not just Bethesda.

Shut up. Even the military, for all its MANY faults, prefers to keep the servicemember with their civilian spouse. Hell, they try to keep dual military couples together.

You were blessed. We were separated two years because of it. Sure, it's nice to stay together but it's not realistic for everyone. Check your privilege but you were probably an officer family.

Um. Enlisted or not, the military never expected your husband to live within a certain radius of his place of employment and for you to not.

Actually, yes they did. We couldn't afford it, so I stayed behind. See how that works.

Troll. You can't "not afford" to move on accompanied orders.

No, we could not afford it. I had a good job and close to retirement. We needed my income till my husband could retire and get a job and start over working their way up which isn’t easy to do in your late 30s.

So you chose to stay for financial reasons. It wasn't that you "couldn't afford" it. The military would have paid your relocation expenses and given your DH accompanied BAH.

No, we could not afford it. Relocation expenses were not the issue.

Oh stop. The military will pay for you to come along. You chose not to which totally makes sense but stop saying it wasn't a choice!

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Straw man. Base officer housing might not be that nice (though why you brought up enlisted housing I have no idea), but BHA definitely is.

Married to an officer. We don’t have access to base housing. Many in the Bethesda area don’t.

This isn't true at all. You have access to base housing on other bases, but you choose to live in Bethesda. You can go to Ft. Mead, Andrews, Bolling, etc.

I actually can’t. Husband has to live within a certain radius of the hospital.

You can live where ever you want. The rule is for your husband, not you and you can live in a cheaper area and not just Bethesda.

Shut up. Even the military, for all its MANY faults, prefers to keep the servicemember with their civilian spouse. Hell, they try to keep dual military couples together.

You were blessed. We were separated two years because of it. Sure, it's nice to stay together but it's not realistic for everyone. Check your privilege but you were probably an officer family.

Um. Enlisted or not, the military never expected your husband to live within a certain radius of his place of employment and for you to not.

Actually, yes they did. We couldn't afford it, so I stayed behind. See how that works.

Troll. You can't "not afford" to move on accompanied orders.

No, we could not afford it. I had a good job and close to retirement. We needed my income till my husband could retire and get a job and start over working their way up which isn’t easy to do in your late 30s.

This really isn’t relevant and you’d think you’d know better than to tell someone just to live apart from their spouse because you chose not to. It’s not that you couldn’t afford it. It didn’t make financial sense.

No, we could not afford it as I did not have a job where he was going and we could not afford to live on just his salary. Enlisted don’t make that much.

Please stop. An E-7 currently makes around $65k a year, plus BAH, plus BAS, but whatever other incentive pay they're entitled to. E.g., enlisted aircrew AIP can be up to $600 a month.

Very few make it to e7 and my spouse did not. You think $65 is a lot of money? Can you live off that? So, no, we could not afford for me to give up my job.

Also, yes, I made $52k when I married my husband, and I lived off it just fine. In Miami, no less.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Straw man. Base officer housing might not be that nice (though why you brought up enlisted housing I have no idea), but BHA definitely is.

Married to an officer. We don’t have access to base housing. Many in the Bethesda area don’t.

This isn't true at all. You have access to base housing on other bases, but you choose to live in Bethesda. You can go to Ft. Mead, Andrews, Bolling, etc.

I actually can’t. Husband has to live within a certain radius of the hospital.

But don’t they still give you lots of money towards your housing costs??

For officers yes, enlisted no and it depends on rank. If they can afford Bethesda they are higher ranking officer.

When I married my husband, he was an O-2. He would be getting $1600 a month for housing now based on our location then. How is that lots of money? He would have been getting the same as an E-6! (Because you're wrong, and enlisted DO get money toward housing. Please stop spouting off your ignorance.)

Your ignorance is showing. You have no clue about enlisted. It is a decent amount of money. You don’t have to live in Bethesda and most live in cheaper areas like us.

You know these numbers are public, right? Here, I reduced the rank a bit.

E 5 with DEPENDENTS:
$ 2880.00
E 5 without DEPENDENTS:
$ 2538.00

But keep going about how you can't afford Bethesda.

Have you purchased or rented in Bethesda in the last decade? That's not a lot. I don't think your numbers show what you want them to.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Straw man. Base officer housing might not be that nice (though why you brought up enlisted housing I have no idea), but BHA definitely is.

Married to an officer. We don’t have access to base housing. Many in the Bethesda area don’t.

This isn't true at all. You have access to base housing on other bases, but you choose to live in Bethesda. You can go to Ft. Mead, Andrews, Bolling, etc.

I actually can’t. Husband has to live within a certain radius of the hospital.

But don’t they still give you lots of money towards your housing costs??

For officers yes, enlisted no and it depends on rank. If they can afford Bethesda they are higher ranking officer.

When I married my husband, he was an O-2. He would be getting $1600 a month for housing now based on our location then. How is that lots of money? He would have been getting the same as an E-6! (Because you're wrong, and enlisted DO get money toward housing. Please stop spouting off your ignorance.)

Your ignorance is showing. You have no clue about enlisted. It is a decent amount of money. You don’t have to live in Bethesda and most live in cheaper areas like us.

You know these numbers are public, right? Here, I reduced the rank a bit.

E 5 with DEPENDENTS:
$ 2880.00
E 5 without DEPENDENTS:
$ 2538.00

But keep going about how you can't afford Bethesda.

Have you purchased or rented in Bethesda in the last decade? That's not a lot. I don't think your numbers show what you want them to.

I just did a search on Zillow for rentals. If you don't have dependents, you get a roommate. If you have dependents, you live in a 2 bedroom apartment. It's not tough.