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Why nobody wants to join the Army this year

Discussion in 'Warfare / Military' started by Nightmare515, Jul 13, 2022.

Page 4 of 9
  1. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Sounds to me like you have your head stuck in the sand. There are some things you just don't want to see.
     
    kazenatsu, Aug 23, 2022
    #76
  2. Junkieturtle

    Junkieturtle Well-Known Member Donor

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    I don't want to derail Nightmare's thread, so I'll just say this and be done with it.

    I don't care if anybody takes the vaccine or not. It doesn't prevent the illness. Now, it's probably smart to take it because it does give your body some extra protection, but since it doesn't prevent infection I don't see why it should be mandatory for anybody. As far as this topic goes, I see mandatory mask wearing as a deal breaker long long before the vaccine is. That's something that you're actually going to feel versus a vaccine that doesn't make you feel any different at all. I think you've got a hangup on the vaccine and you want it to be a problem causer even in areas where it isn't.
     
    Junkieturtle, Aug 23, 2022
    #77
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  3. Nightmare515

    Nightmare515 Ragin' Cajun Staff Member Past Donor

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    All of these reasons are simply one man's opinion (mine) based on a mixture of both anecdotal evidence and legitimate evidence given directly from exit surveys that I have access to that the general public does not. Not because I am anything special but because the "news" the public gets about the military is filtered through both military and civilian news media before it ever gets to the public.

    For example the most recent climate survey given in my particular unit had approximately 80% of Soldiers disapprove of what the US Army calls "Readiness Day" which is a mandatory stand down day once a month requiring all military operations to cease and classes given on everything ranging from understanding transgenders to CRT to suicide prevention to PTSD. My current unit is nothing special and as we all know an Army unit isn't like a regular town in America or anything. People come and go all the time so it's not the same as getting a biased survey in rural Alabama or something. The sentiments of the troops here are a fairly accurate representation of troops overall plus or minus a few data points on the chart. However, given the current social and political climate in America you will absolutely not see an official DoD "news" agency (or an independent news agency representing the military such as the Army Times) publish an article that says "Soldiers overwhelmingly disapprove of transgender acceptance training". It simply won't happen.

    Now with that being said the vaccine thing really wasn't THAT big of a deal in the Army. Sure there were quite a few who refused it and chose to make that their hill to die on but the overwhelming vast majority didn't care enough to resign over it in the grand scheme of things. I have the actual numbers at least for my unit and out of the thousands of Soldiers in this unit we had a total of 15 refusing to take it to the point of being chaptered. When it comes to things that are actually pissing troops off it really isn't the vaccines.

    The Government could come out tomorrow and publicly apologize for the military vaccine mandate and offer to re-instate all discharged servicemembers with full back pay and it would do little to move the retention and recruitment needle because that's not actually something they were upset about in any large numbers. Tackling the retention and recruitment numbers will require acknowledging the elephant in the room that we as a collective society in 2022 have deemed taboo and not allowed to question anymore.
     
    Nightmare515, Sep 9, 2022
    #78
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  4. Nightmare515

    Nightmare515 Ragin' Cajun Staff Member Past Donor

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    The masks did piss people off more than the vaccine for the simply fact that we were flat out directly lied to by the government regarding masks. Here is how this went down in real life.

    Masks were mandated on DoD installations (with some caveats, if you were alone in the office you could take it off, eating, etc just like most other places)
    Vaccine was announced as experimental but available if you wanted to take it
    Official signed statement was put out stating that if you take the vaccine the mask requirement is no longer applicable to you after 2 weeks of receiving the vaccine
    Roughly half of Soldiers (in my unit) choose to get the vaccine just to take the masks off
    Mask mandate returns regardless of vaccine status due to COVID spike
    Soldiers who took experimental vaccine now livid
    Vaccine will likely be made mandatory when FDA approved
    New official guidance: Mask mandate will be lifted once X% of Soldiers in unit receive vaccine
    FDA approves vaccine, vaccine now mandatory for servicemembers
    Servicemembers all take mandatory vaccine
    Mask mandate again lifted
    3 weeks later (literally) mask mandate returns regardless of vaccination status due to new government mandate due to new COVID spike
    Soldiers livid again

    ^^That is what pissed everybody off. We felt like they just flat out lied originally to entice troops to get the vaccine because they couldn't mandate it yet due to it not being FDA approved. Then it's FDA approved and mandated and they said we could take the masks off then they said put them back on less than a month later after everybody got mandatory vaccinated.

    Yeah this whole COVID thing did upset a lot of troops but even with all that it still pales in comparison to the sheer amount of troops upset about the progressive training being mandated in the force at the moment. Folks can look the other way or beat around the bush all they like but raw factual data kills the COVID thing as the scapegoat. They aren't THAT mad about the COVID thing, they're mad about the progressive ideology training and such sentiments being an "unpopular opinion" in modern society isn't going to magically make said sentiments disappear.

    Sorry society but this isn't Stanford or UCLA, this is the US Army and these SOLDIERS don't like this kind of thing and forcing them to "accept it" isn't working out too well.
     
    Nightmare515, Sep 9, 2022
    #79
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  5. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    That is your opinion. They may have angered a greater number of people, but I have a feeling the people who were angered about the vaccine were outraged much more than the people who were just angry about the masks.
    Masks would rarely be a single factor that would cause someone to leave their job, whereas a vaccine requirement sometimes is.
     
    Last edited: Sep 9, 2022
    kazenatsu, Sep 9, 2022
    #80
  6. Nightmare515

    Nightmare515 Ragin' Cajun Staff Member Past Donor

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    Likely yes, however the number of people angered by the vaccine to the point of willing to be discharged was nowhere near as many people as were angered by the mask mandates. As I stated before a total of 15 people out of roughly 4,000 actually stood their ground and got chaptered for refusing the vaccine. Virtually EVERYBODY was pissed off about the masks.

    You may be right though and there's no real way to tell. There's no way to tell exactly what part of "COVID" lead to some folks choosing to get out of the military instead of signing a new contract when their time came. None of the surveys I've seen break it down any further than just "COVID Policy" so it's hard to tell if it was the vaccine or the masks or a combo of both. I know of zero people who refused to wear a mask to the point of being discharged but I do know a few who refused the vaccine to the point of discharge. But those damn masks upset virtually everybody, this is the Army we get shot up with all sorts of who knows what and most don't really care too much. When that vaccine first arrived on scene as "experimental" Soldiers were lining up in droves to take it just because we were promised we could take those damn masks off. That's how much we hated the masks and how little most actually cared about another random shot of who knows what being injected into us along with the other 5 or so we line up to get every year.
     
    Nightmare515, Sep 9, 2022
    #81
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  7. Grey Matter

    Grey Matter Well-Known Member Donor

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    @Nightmare515

    and



    Demographics and economics.

    E1 basic pay as of 2022 works out to $6.92 an hour based on working about 60h/wk for the first four months.

    Then, based on a 50h/wk with 3 weeks leave*:

    E1 pay goes up to about $8.98/h
    A two year E4 gets about $12.32/h
    A four year E5 gets about $14.98/h
    A four or five year O3 works out to about $30/h.

    The all volunteer military is to a very large extent predicated upon these wages attracting folks to serve, is it not?

    Sure, I've left out free housing / BAH and free meals / BAS so it's significantly better than just what the numbers show here, but given the BS that one has to put up with, especially the sitting around inbetween training exercises, well, it's not as attractive a gig as I once viewed it anyway.

    The gender stuff is pretty silly, makes not much sense since everything is structured by rank - or should be anyway. Sounds to me like the military is overcompensating on these issues. Personal pronouns don't come into play when your name is Private Snuffy or PFC WakeYourAssUp....

    *(monthly pay)(12 months)/[(49 weeks)*(50hours/week)
    https://www.dfas.mil/Portals/98/Documents/militarymembers/militarymembers/pay-tables/2022 Military Pay Tables.pdf
     
    Last edited: Sep 10, 2022
    Grey Matter, Sep 10, 2022
    #82
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  8. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    It would have been pretty simple to collect information, if any survey had been taken.
     
    kazenatsu, Sep 10, 2022
    #83
  9. Battle3

    Battle3 Well-Known Member

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    I have Navy family and friends, and they don’t see much gender and pc crap, but they are all in more elite units. The vax was an issue, word is half the SEALs refused to take it.

    What’s causing problems is the new 401k which sucks by any standard, medical sucks because you have to go to Navy doctors and they aren’t that good and don’t like referring people to civilian doctors, reimbursements for moving is a nightmare. Everything seems to be geared to saving money. They make it so hard some will mess and and won’t get paid, some will just not put up with the hassle and won’t apply for the reimbursement.

    And new people stay in 4 years to get VA benefits and then get out. Every area is short handed. In some areas if you have 19 years and your current assignment is up, you used to ask for a 1 year extension and get it, now the Navy says no and you have to take a full 3-4 year assignment and retire at 22-23 years.
     
    Last edited: Sep 10, 2022
    Battle3, Sep 10, 2022
    #84
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  10. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Well, now we know what cutting money to military spending means.
    Translates into cutting benefits for military forces.
     
    kazenatsu, Sep 11, 2022
    #85
  11. JonK22

    JonK22 Well-Known Member

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    Record low unemployment, twice as many job openings as workers even available


    Dubya's 20 year wars, Covid 19 has shown balance work/life.

    Maybe, just maybe we could get by with less than $800 billion spent on the war department?


    President Dwight D. Eisenhower's farewell address, known for its warnings about the growing power of the "military-industrial complex,"
     
    JonK22, Sep 11, 2022
    #86
  12. JonK22

    JonK22 Well-Known Member

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    Sep 13, 2021 — Up to half of the $14 trillion spent by the Pentagon since 9/11 went to for-profit defense contractors, a study released Monday found
    https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politi...ing-for-9-11-wars-went-to-private-contractors


    If the total spending were divided across every U.S. resident, it would amount to $1,803 per U.S. citizen. Of those funds, $439.4 billion (74 percent) were spent on contracts for products and services, while the remaining $154.6 billion (26 percent) paid the salaries of DOD personnel.
    https://www.defense.gov/News/Releas...efense-spending-by-state-in-fiscal-year-2020/
     
    JonK22, Sep 11, 2022
    #87
  13. JonK22

    JonK22 Well-Known Member

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    New 'blended retirement' puts retention at risk

    With the stroke of a pen, the 2016 National Defense Authorization Act transformed the active duty retirement program the Defense Department has used since 1986.


    The "High 36" or the "Career Status Bonus/REDUX" models, have been re-engineered to emulate aspects of private-sector programs. Under the old model, a Marine needed to remain in service for at least 20 years to qualify for a retirement pension, and in return for that commitment, the service member received a defined benefit pension immediately upon retirement.

    The new program called the "Blended Retirement System," provides a 1 percent DOD contribution to the service member's Thrift Savings Plan account after 60 days of service, and up to an additional 4 percent after 36 months of service for those who choose to contribute 5 percent of their salary to the same TSP.

    This program also touts a mid-career retention incentive at the 12-year mark, which is estimated to be worth at a minimum, 2.5 times a month's base pay in return for an additional 4-year commitment. The traditional defined benefit program remains for 20-plus years of service, albeit at a slightly lower rate (2 percent for each year of service versus the former 2.5 percent).

    This is fantastic news for the estimated 81 percent of service men and women who leave with zero retirement benefits. However, it is potentially disastrous for the Marine Corps' ability to retain its best trained and most high investment demographics: its senior captains, majors and staff non-commissioned officers. Failure to retain these mid-grade leaders has the potential to leave gaping holes in a wide array of meticulously managed manpower models. The reason for this dour outlook is directly linked to the Marine Corps losing its "all or nothing" incentive to get Marines to fill hard jobs in less than desirable locations. Like it or not, the 20-year retirement program effectively served as a coercive tool to get mid-career Marines to fill "less than desirable" assignments because they were sufficiently vested and the opportunity cost to vote with their feet (i.e. get out) was too great.
    https://www.marinecorpstimes.com/pa...ew-blended-retirement-puts-retention-at-risk/


    Blended Retirement System Not for Everyone
    Now for the fine print.

    On the surface, the BRS is a cutback. Fundamentally, new service members will not make as much as they would have in the old system. Those are the black-and-white numbers and there’s no way around them, but it’s estimated the BRS will mean an annual savings of about $2-billion to taxpayers.

    “Yes, we’re cutting military retirement benefits,’’
    https://www.incharge.org/military-money/military-life/blended-retirement-system/
     
    JonK22, Sep 11, 2022
    #88
  14. James California

    James California Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Why nobody wants to join the Army this year​

    :worry: ~ Very likely the same reason nobody wants to be a police officer. Now if people would stop going to law school we would have some improvement.
     
    James California, Sep 11, 2022
    #89
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  15. FreshAir

    FreshAir Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Trump was the one that Promised a wall and failed to deliver
     
    Last edited: Sep 11, 2022
    FreshAir, Sep 11, 2022
    #90
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  16. ToughTalk

    ToughTalk Well-Known Member

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    The wall...which progressives fought tooth and nail against because they were high on this bullshit virtue calling it "racist" and the like...is the right idea and what needs to happen.

    See I have one side admitting we need a more secure southern border as this **** has gotten out of hand vs..."let's just quietly bus them to all parts of the United States and hand the problem off"

    I wouldn't bring up the southern border. Statistics and philosophy of the right vs the left are not in your favor right now.
     
    ToughTalk, Sep 11, 2022
    #91
  17. FreshAir

    FreshAir Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    the left offered him the money (since it was obvious Mexico was not gonna pay for it), but Trump turned it down, he just had to agree on the dreamers

    the reason you don't have the wall is Trump did not want to help the dreamers, that is why you do not have a wall

    Trump should have jumped on, but Trump did not know the art of the deal
     
    Last edited: Sep 11, 2022
    FreshAir, Sep 11, 2022
    #92
  18. Lil Mike

    Lil Mike Well-Known Member

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    I dunno, it seems the military industrial complex is riding higher than they did when we were fighting America's wars.
    upload_2022-9-11_9-9-57.png
     
    Lil Mike, Sep 11, 2022
    #93
  19. ToughTalk

    ToughTalk Well-Known Member

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    Are you honestly trying to sling me the bullshit that the left wanted a border wall the moment after Trump made it part of his platform when he was running? Is that what you are trying to tell me?
     
    ToughTalk, Sep 11, 2022
    #94
  20. JonK22

    JonK22 Well-Known Member

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    Money going from US to those wars are down, yes Trump's buddy Putin is causing MIC to raise it's head again though
     
    JonK22, Sep 11, 2022
    #95
  21. JonK22

    JonK22 Well-Known Member

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    No, the "left" has always said a wall where $100 of tools can get through in minutes, is dumb. They have worked on REAL SOLUTIONS

    Democrats have rejected President Donald Trump's border wall as ineffective, expensive and immoral. So what are their solutions to border security?

    Among them: Better technology. Increased hiring for ports of entry. Improved infrastructure, such as fencing.

    Democrats also unveiled legislation last year to expand refugee processing in Central American countries and to disrupt drug cartels.
    https://www.usatoday.com/story/news...wall-democrats-security-solutions/2512363002/
     
    JonK22, Sep 11, 2022
    #96
  22. JonK22

    JonK22 Well-Known Member

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    Mexican smuggling gangs have sawed through new segments of the border wall 3272 times over the past three years
    https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/03/02/trump-border-wall-breached/


    NO PAYWALL LINK

    https://archive.ph/acNWS

    Feb 10, 2022 — The Trump border wall failed for all the predictable reasons. Immigrants used cheap ladders to climb over it, or they free climb it.
    https://www.cato.org/blog/border-wall-didnt-work

    All Eight Border Wall Prototypes Fail Breach Tests
    https://www.archdaily.com/909413/all-eight-border-wall-prototypes-fail-breach-tests
     
    JonK22, Sep 11, 2022
    #97
  23. Mushroom

    Mushroom Well-Known Member

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    That was actually enacted because a hell of a lot of people were complaining that if they did not complete 20 years, they got nothing. So this was enacted so that everybody who served would get some kind of pension that they could roll over later into a civilian 401k or some other program.

    And really? You are pulling that from a company that does debt relief?
     
    Mushroom, Sep 11, 2022
    #98
  24. FreshAir

    FreshAir Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    they did not want a wall across the entire southern border, but they were willing to trade Trump money for his wall for the dreamers
     
    FreshAir, Sep 11, 2022
    #99
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  25. JonK22

    JonK22 Well-Known Member

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    Yes and it does change how many will stay for 20 or the 30 year retirement (50% & 75% OLD SYSTEMS)

    I pulled it from a a link from there yes, do you have a problem with what was posted? Anything? Didn't think so


    AGAIN, IT WAS A CUT

    My Dad retired Army and I grew up on the Monterey Peninsula (Ft Ord, NPS, MIIS, POM), was involved heavily in American Legion and VFW
     
    Last edited: Sep 11, 2022
    JonK22, Sep 11, 2022
    #100
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