washington scene
Regardless of reemployment protections, periodic long-term absences from the civilian workplace can only limit these servicemembers’ upward mobility and employability, as well as personal financial security. MOAA supports enactment of a comprehensive reserve retirement scheme based on an age-and-service (including operational service) formula.
Compensation comparability
Over the past 12 years, Congress has made great progress toward restoring full military pay comparability with that of the private sector. For most of the 1980s and ’90s, the executive and legislative branches capped military pay raises below those of the private sector. As a result, the pay gap grew as large as 13.5 percent, causing a retention and readiness crisis. Subsequently, executive and legislative branch leaders worked to improve military pay.
In 2013, the administration proposed capping military pay at 1 percent, 0.8-per-centage points below private-sector pay growth — and we are concerned this is only the beginning. History shows pay caps continue until they negatively affect readiness. MOAA strongly objects to the proposal as it would renew the unwise pay-cap process that generated retention crises in the 1970s and ’90s. Sustaining pay comparability is essential to long-term retention and readiness.
Family support
Preserve funding for family support; morale, welfare, and recreation; exchange; commissary; and other critical support services and quality-of-life programs. Improve and enhance access to affordable quality child care. Promote and support programs to assist children dealing with deployment-related issues. MOAA recognizes the significance of continued crucial support of military family members bearing the brunt on the home front of more than a decade at war. MOAA will work with Congress, DoD, and others in ensuring necessary family support and quality-of-life services are provided across all components, installations, and communities.
Operational Guard and Reserve
Support nonemergency use of the Guard/ Reserve in the operating force. Ensure robust financial, legal, and reemployment protections for activated servicemembers. Multiple deployments of the Guard and Reserve bring significant strains on their employers. MOAA supports permanent tax incentives to help employers sustain business operations during call-ups. MOAA believes new DoD-employer partnership initiatives — such as authority for employer payment of employees’ TRICARE Reserve Select premiums in lieu of other employer-provided coverage — will be essential to sustain employers’ willingness to hire and retain drilling members of the Guard and Reserve.
PCS reimbursements
Continue pursuing PCS reimbursement increases to offset expenses servicemembers incur in complying with government-ordered relocations. PCS mileage rates are dramatically lower than temporary duty rates, and servicemembers are denied funded house-hunting trips authorized for federal employees. Families require authority to ship a second vehicle overseas. More must be done to recognize it’s the government’s responsibility, not the servicemember’s, to pay the cost of military-directed moves.
Post-9/11 GI Bill benefits
Sustain the Post-9/11 GI Bill program to support the readjustment of hundreds of thousands of new veterans as the armed forces cut manpower in the coming years.
48 MILITARY OFFICER JANUARY 2014
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