Smokin

You can see how many really care about making a political statement when the Cowboys threatened to fire anyone who knelt. All stood. Either everyone on that team feels very different than the rest of the NFL, or the NFL players in general really don't believe in whatever it is they're 'protesting'.

Debt should only a problem if it is unreasonable for your background. You went to med school for two years and then decided you wanted to be a pilot? Shouldn't be a problem to have 100K debt. You went on a week long bender in Vegas and racked up 50K in gambling debt? That's a problem. Your no kidding credit history, how many credit cards you've had, etc, is only relevant in so far as it determines if you are a responsible individual that can be trusted with our nation's secrets.

A little off topic, but I'm not sure what you propose is any different than it is now. Guys get selected for school out of their major's board are auto leadership track unless they decline (which you can do now without being a 7-day opt). Others get picked up for school on later looks and join the leadership track. Want to be on the flying track? Don't go to school. Done.

Just the latter? If they really start involuntary mobilizations for individual non-combat deployments, I think you'll see guys across the board start to walk. Even guys within a couple years of 20 active time would consider walking. Won't get sent away from your family for six months only to make unnecessary powerpoints with the airlines. Interesting point to ponder, is a command tour something you can really non-vol someone into? If said commander does literally nothing as a commander other than sleep, eat, and workout, will he get sent home for 'lack of confidence'? With squadron commanders getting fired right and left over the past five years, seems like it would be easy to turn a 6 month tour into a 6 week trip. And since he's guard, if he did get sent home, could big blue really do anything about it if his TAG had his back?

I know every airframe is different in terms of STRD vulnerability, but your risk level has to be approaching extreme. Last I heard, before I went to the guard and quit caring about STRD, F-16 guys were getting non-vol'd out of cycle around 5 years after their STRD. No way would I take the two year bonus (at least at current prices) knowing that it'd put me on a 365, but to each their own.

At least they finally updated it to be 'run, hide,... oh yeah, and I guess fight back if there's no other option.'

With how many non-combat deployments (TSP, etc) there have been in the last 15 years, I'm actually surprised there aren't more senior guys with no combat experience. Maybe other types of air frames are different, but for fighters you are at the mercy of your squadron's tasking. With the possible exception of one or two random attached guys who may be given the option, you're either going or not going and it makes no difference if you want to go or not. I personally have known multiple fighter guys who as majors and lt cols had 1000+ hrs and zero combat time just due to timing and bad luck. I also have known capts with more combat time than non-combat time and they were well over the 1000 hr mark. Timing is everything and there is no justice.

Agreed that you should start high and then it all depends on the moving company initially. I just finished this process a few months ago and actually felt the end result was fine although it took a lot of time. They lost about a dozen boxes and they offered me the full amount claimed for everything they lost. I put in a rough guess on replacement costs for various things that were totaled. They offered on average about 2/3 the amount I claimed for broken stuff. Make sure you don't get rid of anything unless it is dangerous to keep (broken glass, etc). Even with pictures, I was offered nothing for a couple things I threw out saying the "damage was not able to be verified". I over-estimated broken and damaged things to leave room for their counter-offer, which ended up being pretty fair.

ACSC might actually be the best analogy yet to big blue's, an apparently Congress' approach... 'I don't care what the facts are, I don't care about getting to the bottom of the cause, I don't really want to even be talking about this. What is the absolute fastest way to make it look like I care, make it look like I did my research, but really just get a passing grade so I can move on.'

I don't blame those dudes for voicing their opinions, but they probably could have framed the argument better. If money doesn't matter then why is the bonus thread on page 139? If money doesn't matter, then why do all the airline guys talk about how much money they can make and all the AD guys ease drop whenever the conversation comes up?

Or maybe no one is talking about it because the AF has zero credibility for things like this. I'll believe it when I see it on my LES and it's more than a $50 pay jump.

Shooter's name is Monalisa... that should be enough said as to why no one figured out this was a bad idea.

A 30 mph crosswind gust could cause a runway departure. If the grass on the side of the runway wasn't level then that would cause the far side to dip while the crosswinds lifted the other wing. The wind could then continue to lift the raised wing further and maybe flip it. Not saying this is what happened, we'll hear it from the AIB/SIB, but the theory is possible.

It'd take a lot more than that for some hurt feelings around here. The single engine thing is a common jab from other platforms, but generally over-rated as an actual problem. If you go back and look at all the Viper Class A's in the last decade, very few of them would have turned out any different with a second engine. Even with engine issues on two engine fighters, if one engine shells itself and starts throwing blades, that probably isn't good for the other engine sitting a few feet away. Just reference the F-18 crash in San Diego a few years ago. One bad engine soon led to no engines.

F-16's make up almost half of the Air Force's total fighter inventory, just might be a factor in accident numbers.

Did he do a victory roll over the carrier prior to landing?

It makes sense to the AF because the AF used that as an additional carrot to get guys to take the early signup. If a guy was sure he was staying in, he gets money as soon as his commitment is up (could be big difference if he graduated UPT early in the FY). Without the carrot that you could get the larger amount if the amount increased during your normal year, many guys last year wouldn't have taken the early option on rumors of bigger money next year. The AF wants guys to sign early as it provides them predictability and keeps them from starting to think about other options (generally bad for the AF these days). Based on both parties getting something out of the deal, it makes sense. That is, until the AF bends the guys over... How many guys do you think are going to do the early sign up this year now that this is public?

I just read a story about that. I'd consider having a lawyer look over the verbiage and see if that's legit. When I looked at the early eligible option when on active duty, it didn't say anything about extending your ADSC. Total horseshit like that is why guys are leaving. Telling about some of the AF leadership's true colors when they hide stuff like that in something that is supposed to increase retention. Is the AF still confused as to why dudes are punching right and left?

I agree that if you do some serious work, you can beat 2.5%. For example, one of the AMEX cards gives you 5% for grocery stores. I've heard of guys going and buying gift cards at grocery stores for all their other shopping to max that out. I'd just worry I'd lose one and then would lose more than the money I made. But as the previous poster alluded to, I only consider it savings if it actually saved me money. If I wouldn't have bought it or paid that much for it, it's not a savings for me. $220 for 3 breakfasts? $16K for a 9 hr flight? Better be some really personal 'service' inside the first class suite for that price. Not a chance I'd pay anywhere near that money, so I wouldn't have "saved" $16K. Finally, I have more than 200K ultimate reward points and I only spent $8K total on two cards to get them. I'm approaching 300K Marriott rewards points and after the initial $4K in spending on that card, I only use the Marriott card at Marriott properties (and since I'm Platinum, I'd get those breakfasts free also). The rest of my spending goes on my 2.5% card. To each their own, I just don't see those numbers as realistic savings.

For what its worth, realize that the biggest benefits to having these cards come simply by having them. For day to day spending, other than a bonus category, the USAA 2.5% cash back card is pretty much impossible to beat. I have the better part of a dozen credit cards at a given time and the USAA is my go-to as I haven't found anything else to beat 2.5%.

I keep hearing guys say, "it's not about the money" but that's a load of bull. It may not ALL be about the money, but at some point, money talks. The AF should find solutions to most of the laundry list of reasons guys get out, but that is going to take years. Make the bonus jaw-dropping and you'll keep enough guys in to buy time to figure out how to fix the rest. I'd bet most of the guys getting hired by the majors right now are doing it for two reasons, money and work schedule. If the AF could figure out either (or both ideally), the exodus would be far more manageable.

It has been released, emailed to me so not sure where it is posted. Looks fairly similar to last year in terms of amounts and contract years. Dollar amounts went up $5K in most cases but added a few different tiers from what I remember from last years. No re-upping to the new amount if you're already under contract.

This line of logic on behalf of the airlines is bull. Compare a list of guys on long term mil-leave to guys on long term medical leave and tell me that the military leave is what is really breaking their system. Last I heard from a Delta pilot, the ratio of long term sick leave to long term mil leave was in the ballpark of 10:1. The airlines may complain about guys 'abusing' USERRA, but United sure didn't seem too heartbroken about using bankruptcy court to kill fixed pensions they should still be paying out today. If the shoe were on the other foot, the company would use every power the law gave them to maximize their profit. Why is it somehow wrong when employees do the same thing?

Except discrimination laws... This entire meeting baffles my mind. I don't see how either side can legally influence the other to do anything. If the Air Force leaders somehow convince the airlines to stop military hiring, that is illegal discrimination. If the Air Force stops giving long term orders to guard/reserve guys employed by the airlines, that is also discrimination. The only thing is the airlines could do is hire a representative number of military guys to better represent the total applicant pool. But even that would only slow the hiring of military pilots temporarily. The one thing this does accomplish is prove to guys looking to get out that big Air Force is not looking out for them and instead is actively trying to remove post-military employment opportunities.

I agree that you need to elevate this very high very fast. A congressman (is he still around here?) who cares about actually helping troops needs to look into BS like this. At least you never actually got paid twice. Had you been paid twice, you would have had the taxes withheld, then the DFAS debt would have been the full pre-tax amount. Talk about a nice little kick in the junk. Not only does that cause additional work to fix someone else's mistake, you literally have to pay for it too. And if they don't get the correct amount on your W-2, or they catch it after taxes are filed, too bad. I got double paid for a day when I switched types of guard orders. Didn't notice it at the time because it was a single day and they had already messed up multiple other things on my pay. DFAS, or someone, caught it in April the following year and almost sent my debt to a collections agency because I was only notified by mail and was TDY at the time. Not a huge amount of money, but insulting that I had to pay taxes and interest on someone else's mistake.