Commission interim report ‘sets stage’ for soldiers’ pay reform

[unhappycamper]

http://www.thenewstribune.com/2014/07/05/3275465/commission-interim-report-sets.html?sp=/99/261/

Commission interim report ‘sets stage’ for soldiers’ pay reform
By TOM PHILPOTT
Contributing Writer
July 5, 2014

Military folks upset that recent defense budgets have targeted their pay and benefits have no reason to fear a new 358-page interim report from the Military Compensation and Retirement Modernization Commission.

The nine-member blue-ribbon panel does present, in impressive detail, the full range of military and veteran pays, allowances and benefits that Congress has enacted over recent decades, including the last 13 years of war. Recruiters could use the document to great effect if not for its heft.

But the commission reaches no conclusions on whether any of the compensation offerings, or their combined effect, is excessive. Therefore, it gives little comfort to budget analysts and even military leaders who want to dampen compensation costs through caps on pay raises and housing allowances, hikes in health care fees and cuts to the commissary benefit.

Commission Chairman Alphonso Maldon Jr. said the intent of the interim report is to present a “comprehensive resource tool” for understanding military compensation. It shows what commissioners have learned the past year and “sets the stage” for critical analysis and recommendations to modernize compensation. A final report to President Barack Obama and Congress is due next February.

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You can read the report at: http://www.mcrmc.gov/index.php/reports