[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 32 (Tuesday, March 2, 1999)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2152-S2153]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     MILITARY PAY AND BENEFITS BILL

 Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I ask that the article entitled ``A 
Military Problem Money Can't Solve,'' which appeared in this morning's 
New York Times, be printed in the Record. It helps to illustrate why 
the Senate should have taken a closer look at the provisions of S. 4 
before voting on it. Had hearings been held on the bill, and had we 
awaited the completion of studies by the CBO, GAO and Defense 
Department, perhaps some Senators would have had a chance to become 
familiar with the reasons that our service men and women leave the 
military. As this article makes clear, retention may depend more on 
improving quality of life than increasing pay and pensions.
  The article follows:

              [The New York Times, Tuesday, Mar. 2, 1999]

                  A Military Problem Money Can't Solve

                      (By Lucian K. Truscott 4th)

       Los Angeles.--While members of the armed services are 
     underpaid and over-worked, the bill recently passed by the 
     Senate that gives them a pay raise doesn't address the real 
     problem: keeping skilled officers and noncommissioned 
     officers from leaving in mid-career.
       The Army, Navy and Air Force now face serious enlistment 
     shortfalls. For example, last year the Navy fell 7,000 short 
     of its recruitment goal. The bill would raise military pay 
     4.8 percent and increase reenlistment bonuses and retirement 
     benefits.
       But even if the improved benefit package helps attract more 
     recruits, there will continue to be a shortfall unless the 
     military does more to keep mid-career soldiers from 
     resigning.
       Over the past few years, I have been in touch with more 
     than 100 men and women who have resigned from the service, 
     chiefly because my last two books have been about the 
     military. Not once have I heard them say that they left the 
     service because the pay was low. For many, quality-of-life 
     factors drove them away.

[[Page S2153]]

       They complain that junior officers and enlisted men and 
     women with families are assigned to military housing that is 
     old and badly maintained. On many bases both here and abroad, 
     there is a shortage of housing, forcing many young families 
     to live off the base. Civilian landlords in neighborhoods 
     near military bases often charge above-market rents because 
     they know military families are a captive market.
       Deployments to far-off ``peace-keeping'' missions are 
     another reason for mid-career attrition. With all of the 
     services shorthanded, assignments to these hardship missions 
     are far more frequent than in the past. Moreover, to soldiers 
     who have been trained to fight, many of these peacekeeping 
     missions seem pointless.
       But the complaint I've heard as often as any other has been 
     about the system for advancement. One former officer told me 
     that the military's traditional ``zero defects'' policy now 
     applies to careers, not just to the readiness of a unit or to 
     effectiveness in combat. One bad rating from a senior officer 
     can end a career. ``Everyone seems afraid to take the 
     slightest chance at making a mistake,'' he said, for fear of 
     getting a bad review.
       So the mid-level officers may be jumping ship because the 
     solution--which would include dissolving the unfair ratings 
     system--is too radical to ever be considered.
       Dissatisfaction with the overall ratings system for 
     officers also helps to explain why the 20 percent increase in 
     retirement benefits called for in the Senate bill is unlikely 
     to improve retention rates. There are fewer slots as you go 
     higher in rank, so promotions get harder.
       In the past, for example, a major who wasn't promoted to 
     lieutenant colonel could stay at the same rank and still get 
     full retirement benefits after 20 years of service. Now many 
     of those who don't get promoted are asked to leave the 
     military.
       The new officer rating system, established a year ago, has 
     rigorous quotas that insure that only a certain number of 
     soldiers are promoted--and reach retirement age. The ratings 
     system uses four levels, but no more than half of the 
     soldiers a superior officer oversees can be given the top 
     rating. Soldiers who consistently score at the top are the 
     ones who will qualify for retirement benefits, the bulk of 
     which kick in at 20 years of service.
       But that means the other half has little or no chance of 
     qualifying for retirement, and it's this group that is more 
     likely to resign from the service at mid-career. Several 
     former military men have told me that after receiving what 
     they considered to be unfair low ratings as junior officers 
     they drew the conclusion that they would never be able to 
     serve 20 years and reach retirement. Each of them decided to 
     resign early rather than stick around and learn late in his 
     career that his services were no longer wanted by the 
     military.
       ``They tell you that if you're not going to go all the way 
     to 20, you'd better get out by the end of your eighth year, 
     because the corporate world won't take you after that,'' one 
     former soldier explained.
       Many former soldiers I have corresponded with have 
     described their decisions to resign from the military as 
     complex and painful. But the emotion they express most 
     frequently is anger.
       ``I think the most important reason for leaving is that the 
     Army pays lip service to taking care of its own, but it 
     really doesn't,'' one former officer wrote.
       Still another former military man described the plight of 
     the mid-career professional soldier this way: ``They are sent 
     to far-off places with inadequate support, pointless missions 
     and foolish rules of engagement so the cocktail party set 
     back in D.C. . . . can have their consciences feel good.''
       Many of the military men and women I've interviewed see no 
     one in senior leadership positions standing up and telling 
     the politicians that while a pay raise is nice, there are a 
     lot of other problems that need to be addressed. As one 
     former officer wrote me, ``Money would help, but it will not 
     cure.''

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