[Vision2020] An End of Retirement as You Know It

[lfalen]

Thanks for the info Tom.
I have printed it off along with the first two lists of contracts. I will look them over.
Roger
-----Original message-----
From: Tom Hansen thansen at moscow.com
Date: Mon, 04 Feb 2008 16:34:28 -0800
To: vmfp-wa at mansker.org,  vision2020 at moscow.com
Subject: [Vision2020] An End of Retirement as You Know It

> Note to roger Falen:  Is this the type support for our troops we can 
> anticipate with further permanent tax cuts?
> 
> If interested, here is a short sampling of government defense contracts:
> 
> http://www.defenselink.mil/Contracts/
> 
> >From the February 11, 2008 (that's right, it's always a week ahead) 
> edition of the Army Times -
> 
> ------------------------------------------------
> 
> An end of retirement as you know it?
> 
> Commission proposes all troops wait 20 or more years to draw retiree pay
> By William H. McMichael - bmcmichael at militarytimes.com
> Posted : February 11, 2008
> 
> A congressionally chartered commission has called for scrapping the entire 
> military retirement system and making active-duty troops wait until at 
> least age 57 or longer to begin drawing retired pay.
> 
> The proposal, which would spell the end of the current active-duty system 
> that pays nondisability retirement immediately after a service member 
> completes a minimum of 20 years of service, is among 95 recommendations in 
> the final report of the Commission on the National Guard and Reserve, 
> which went well beyond its original charter to review the structure and 
> management of the reserve components and delved into personnel policies 
> for active-duty members.
> 
> Under current retirement rules, an active-duty member is eligible for 
> retired pay immediately after completing a minimum of 20 years of service, 
> which can be as young as age 37. However, reservists must wait until age 
> 60 to draw retired pay, although a law signed Jan. 28 by President Bush 
> allows reservists to draw retired pay 90 days earlier than age 60 for 
> every 90 days of mobilization in support of a contingency operation.
> 
> Under the commission’s plan, a revamped retired system would grant limited 
> retirement benefits starting at 10 years of service, although payments 
> would not begin until age 62. Those who serve at least 20 years could 
> receive payments at age 60, and those who serve 30 years at age 57.
> 
> Under the plan, troops could begin drawing retirement pay at younger ages, 
> but the annuity would be reduced 5 percent for each year that a member is 
> under the statutory minimum retirement age. The commission said that would 
> bring the military in line with the Federal Employees Retirement System.
> 
> The commission concluded that combining the training, promotion and 
> management of active and reserve troops into one system is the only way 
> the nation’s military can become a truly efficient operational force for 
> the future. 
> 
> “The increasing cost of personnel, and the challenges of recruiting and 
> retaining qualified individuals, will, we believe, inevitably require 
> reductions in the size of the active force,” states the 432-page report, 
> released Jan. 31. “This shrinking active force will necessarily be 
> accompanied by an increased reliance on reserve forces for operations, 
> particularly for homeland missions. The overall effectiveness of those 
> forces will depend on greater integration of the reserves with the active 
> component.” 
> 
> The commission argued that modifying the 20-year retirements would give 
> the services an incentive to retain troops whom they want to keep for more 
> than 10 years but for less than 20. Additional pay or bonuses would be 
> needed to keep such troops in uniform beyond 10 years in order to maintain 
> retention rates. 
> 
> “As part of the reformed retirement system, retention would be encouraged 
> by making service members eligible to receive ‘gate pay’ at pivotal years 
> of service,” the report said. “Such pay would come in the form of a bonus 
> equal to a percentage of annual basic pay at the end of the year of 
> service, at the discretion of the services.”
> 
> In addition, the report said Congress should expand current law to permit 
> all service members to receive up to 5 percent of annual basic pay in 
> matching government contributions to the Thrift Savings Plan. Service 
> members currently receive no government matching funds for TSP 
> contributions.
> 
> “The government’s contribution would vest at 10 years of service, and the 
> Thrift Savings Plan benefit would be portable and thus capable of being 
> rolled over into a civilian 401(k) account,” the report said.
> 
> Among the report’s other recommendations:
> 
> • The military’s promotion system should be competency-based vs. time-
> based.
> 
> • Active and reserve officer personnel management systems should be merged 
> into a single system.
> 
> • The number of duty statuses should be reduced from 29 to two — on active 
> duty or off.
> 
> • The Pentagon should implement a combined pay and personnel system to 
> eliminate problems with incorrect pay, low data quality, multiple 
> personnel files and inaccurate credit for service.
> 
> • The Guard and reserve should be given the clear lead in Defense 
> Department homeland security missions within U.S. borders.
> 
> The recruiting and job market landscape has shifted in dramatic ways, the 
> commission said, which means the Defense Department “must recruit, train 
> and maintain a technologically advanced force in an era that will be 
> characterized by ever-increasing competition for a shrinking pool of 
> qualified individuals whose expectations about career paths and mobility 
> are changing dramatically.”
> 
> “We need to look at our manpower assets with a totally integrated 
> approach,” commission Chairman Arnold Punaro said.
> 
> For active and reserve service members, such a system would create 
> a “seamless” transition to and from active duty — “on-ramps” and “off-
> ramps,” as Navy personnel officials have described the concept. Basing 
> promotions on competency rather than time would keep troops competitive 
> within the system.
> 
> The 95 recommendations in the report also include a call for the reserves 
> to be reorganized into two formal categories: operational and strategic 
> reserve forces.
> 
> The operational reserve would consist of Selected Reserve units and 
> individual mobilization augmentees who would deploy periodically. The 
> strategic reserve would include Selected Reserve personnel and augmentees 
> not scheduled for rotational active-duty tours and the “most ready, 
> operationally current and willing members of the Individual Ready Reserve.”
> 
> The commission also called for scrapping the Standby Reserve category and 
> said members who are not “viable mobilization assets should be excluded 
> from the total reserve force.”
> 
> The Defense Department would have to consistently provide the support 
> needed to ensure the sustained viability of both forces, and Congress and 
> the Pentagon would determine the missions for each.
> 
> “There used to be an understanding that if you were ready for the away 
> game, you were ready for the home game,” Punaro said. “Most everyone 
> admits that’s not the case anymore. We need a very ready force at home in 
> peacetime, just like we need a ready force for the overseas mission.”
> 
> The reserves were conceived as a strategic force that would be called to 
> active duty only in national emergencies. But they have morphed over the 
> past 18 years, beginning with the 1991 Persian Gulf War and spurred by the 
> military drawdown of the 1990s, into an operational reserve that is now 
> regularly called upon to meet the demands of the wars in Iraq and 
> Afghanistan.
> 
> “It’s clear that if you hadn’t had an operational Guard and reserve, you 
> would have had to go back to the draft, which I think everyone agrees 
> is ... pretty unacceptable,” Punaro said.
> 
> Punaro said he is “very bullish” on the prospects for the commission’s 
> work to receive serious attention.
> 
> Half of the 95 recommendations “can be done immediately,” he said. About 
> 40 will require congressional or presidential action, according to the 
> report. 
> 
> ------------------------------------------------
> 
> Pro patria, 
>  
> Tom Hansen
> SFC, US Army (Retired)
> Moscow, Idaho
>  
> "Patriotism is not a short and frenzied outburst of emotion but the 
> tranquil and steady dedication of a lifetime." 
>  
> -- Adlai E. Stevenson,
> Jr.
> 
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