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The last comprehensive review of VA health care was done nearly 20 years ago. That effort led to the transformation of the VA health system, enrollment reform, creation of more than 800 VA community-based clinics, and emphasis on comprehensive and preventive care for veterans. Until the mid-1990s, the VA mostly was known for repairing veterans’ war wounds but not providing complete care.

Troops, Chiefs at Odds on Pay

Surveys show troops don’t support pay proposals.

Sequestration places uniformed service leaders in a difficult position, a position MOAA thinks, if continued, would put national security at risk. Sequestration has Pentagon uniformed and civilian leaders attempting to balance a budget that is taking a top-line cut of $1 trillion over 10 years. Based on that burden, the Pentagon has put everything on the table to find savings — including the pay and benefits needed to sustain the all-volunteer force.

In a May 6 hearing, the Joint Chiefs testified before the full Senate Armed Services Committee and unanimously defended pay and benefit proposals that “slow the growth” of personnel cost growth by shifting costs onto currently serving members and military retirees and their families.

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Army Gen. Martin Dempsey told the senators, “We’ve been tasked to reduce the defense budget by up to $1 trillion over 10 years while upholding our sacred obligation to properly train, equip, and prepare the force.”

Dempsey said all of the Joint Chiefs and all of the services’ senior enlisted leaders support the proposals to “rebalance military compensation.”

But do the troops?

Several defense leaders in separate hearings said the servicemembers they’ve talked to are willing to accept pay and benefit changes as long as they can get the training and equipment needed to do their jobs.

This feedback flies in the face of recent survey data.

So who are these defense leaders talking to, and what does the survey say? It appears they are not talking to servicemembers and their families who are taking online surveys.

MOAA conducted a compensation survey in March. Of the 4,700 currently serving members who responded, more than 65 percent indicated they were least satisfied with their basic pay.

In a survey conducted by The Washington Post and the Kaiser Family Foundation of Post-9/11 veterans and currently serving members, 83 percent indicated they do not favor the Pentagon’s FY 2015 proposals to cap pay, cut commissary benefits, and increase housing and health care costs.

A Military.com survey found 90 percent of active duty servicemembers rejected the proposed changes to pay and benefits issued by the Pentagon.

The Association of the United States Navy (AUSN) also conducted a poll. In the same hearing where the Joint Chiefs testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee, AUSN President Vice Adm. John Totushek, USN (Ret), said their survey found the same results as Military.com.

“We did a recent study basically asking people to tell us what they thought about the impending changes, and 90 percent of them didn’t like what was being proposed,” Totushek said. “What the chiefs are hearing might not be what’s really going on.”