Are foreign service benefits excessive or reasonable given the sacrifices?

[Anonymous]

Another FSO here. Single mom at a hardship post. I think the benefits are great, but the cons for us are different than some.

Pros for us:

-Renting my place out and having my housing covered!

-Language immersion for DC. We don't attend the international schools recommended by post. DC is the foreigner at school and her friends are primarily local kids (middle to upper middle class families).

-I primarily hang with dual cits or foreign nationals and have a ball doing so. I feel like if we were going to stick with Americans, we could've stayed in DC. My perspective has changed a lot. The biggest surprise is how much more proud I am to be an American woman. I don't mind paying taxes because our roads are paved, the police are responsive, and I had options other than marrying some old guy in order to get ahead

-Opportunity to pay off debt

-I have met Heads of State formally (official receptions) and informally (at a rooftop party, ha!)

Cons:

-Dating...It's rough when most local men make less than $200 month. I never had a problem dating in the US.

-Privacy can be a challenge. Some people love living on an Embasy compound. As a single woman, it wouldn't work for me at all.

-I pay more for childcare in the field. At home, my ex and I stagger our schedules and don't need before/aftercare. I also have family around to babysit if needed. I currently pay for a FT nanny and PT nanny as back up for the required "fun" I have to participate in (the cocktails some love that are quite boring to me), plus a driver, a car solely for DC's transport, language classes, etc.

-Flight costs to visit family. It's important that DC knows our family and spends quality time with her dad. 1 trip a year isn't enough so I spend money here.

-Lack of green space/kid friendly areas. I never thought I would need a driver and separate car for my kid. In a former life, I would've considered it snobby. Here, it's the only way my kid is able to have a life. We are not able to take public transit of any kind and kidnappings used to be a major issue. Also, since we don't use the Embassy school, we're on our own for transportation.

DC still has friends in the US and spends summers (and holidays/breaks) there. We will probably spend 40% of grade school years abroad, so I doubt fitting in at home will be an issue. I am still happy I joined. I believe that singles/married folks without kids can make a huge sum of money abroad. Those of us with kids as well, but at a slower pace. We still feel at home in DC and have lots of family and friends to keep us busy when we're in town. I can't imagine us feeling awkward once we move back in 2 years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The foreign service kids I grew up with were a mess. Most of them made it through college but didn't amount to much. They had this sense of entitlement. It was really sad.

This has been my experience, as well.

[Anonymous]

Excessive or not, I have to agree with an early PP who said it keeps our diplomats from connecting with locals and doing the job they signed up to do. I met many FSOs with poor attitudes always complaining about the lives they chose, even though we were very pampered. This from a trailing spouse of a fed posted at a us consulate.

As far as dual fso couples. All three that I know of have always served together. None had even one separated tours. I don't think it was always easy to stay together but each had to make sacrifices to make it work.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Forgot to mention this key benefit:

Access to cheap labor. So a full time nanny, cleaner, gardener, cook, driver, or whatever can be had for $150-$500 per month. These people work much harder and sometimes even better than your average American. And you get the satisfaction of knowing that you are helping them since you are paying more than the market rate. This also means cheap salon services, massages, tutors for the kids, etc. etc.

This isn't the case in many countries.

[Anonymous]

I would also like to know what was OPs intent with this post - can't tell if they feel like they are getting too few benefits or too many.

I think most of the benefits we get are necessary, like the provided housing/housing allowance, COLA, school tuition, etc. you'd be hard pressed to find volunteers if their paycheck couldn't allow them to live on the economy, or if they had to pay out of pocket private school tuition for access to US-equivalent education.

I do agree with whoever posted that a big negative is that the trailing spouse often loses out on a career. This is true. The salary and benefits need to make up for having a one breadwinner household. This is why people like to stay abroad - they can't afford to live in the DC area for their Washington assignments.

As for FS kids, I don't see the sense of entitlement in young kids - could possibly in some of the older ones but most FS "brats" we know are far from it and have turned out to be really interesting, fun, bright young people.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am a U.S. diplomat. Here are some benefits that some of us enjoy.

1. Post differential or hardship pay. This is 5-35% more than your base pay.
2. Danger pay. This can be 5-40% of base pay as well. So those working in places like Afghanistan get nearly double their base salary.
3. Travel benefits. Free plane ticket each year to the U.S. or a nearby vacation spot of your choice. Worth about $1,500+ per traveler.
4. Home leave. This is an extra 15 days of vacation time for each year you live overseas.
5. Per diem. Some of us travel 5-50% of the time. This means we get about $100/day for food and misc expenses. And our hotel is reimbursed. Some of us become gold/platinum members which means free drinks and snacks. And we keep the hotel and airline points. For a 5 night trip, the hotel and airline points alone can be worth $50-$250.
6. I estimate our foreign service pension to be worth about $25,000 per year of work.
7. I estimate the 401K matching to be worth $4,000-$6,000 per year.
8. Health benefits are good, comparable to most large companies. We have access to an embassy medical unit. Assuming about 5 free visits per year, and this is worth about $500 per year. Sometimes, we get basic medicines for free. If you are pregnant overseas, you get lots of money to deliver in the U.S.
9. Education benefits. If your kids are learning disabled or advanced, you can receive extra money to help them. You have an allowance to attend a top private school in your country. Some people send their kids to boarding schools in Europe. Benefit is worth up to $50,000 per child, but usually it is less.
10. Housing allowance: Worth up to $30,000/year. We rent our U.S. home when we live overseas.
11. Security: We get free security services since many of these places are dangerous.
12. Holidays. We enjoy about 10 federal and 10 local holidays each year.
13. Moving allowance: We can ship our household goods and 1 car. At the end of our tour, some people sell their things at cost. So you can drive a car for 1-4 years without paying for depreciation. In the U.S. the same car would be worth $5,000 less.

Have I forgotten any other benefits? There are LOTS of sacrifices too and maybe I'll write about that next.
Is this too generous or not generous enough given the hardships? Some people envy us, but many know that they can't make the sacrifices needed to enjoy the above benefits.
As you can imagine, some of us save and become millionaires. Some of us can easily spend it all and then some.

There's the language training benefit. 11 years as a FSO, 3 of them spent learning two different languages full time and being paid for it. - Priceless

[Anonymous]

Having served overseas for a government contractor (and therefore entitled to many of the same benefits, but not all), I think a lot depends on the post.

Some places I've been the allowances barely allow you to scrape by. Others, I'm banking 80% of what I'm allotted. Theoretically everything is geared towards local cost of living, but this isn't always accurately gauged.