Buzz

This is an interesting read. My initial thoughts were of my own AF progression: SUPT $1,000,000, IFF $150,000, F-16 RTU $2,000,000, MQT and all flights in the F-16 including RAP requirements, NVG training, 2 FLUG, 4 FLUG, etc. $4.5 to $5 million, T-38 PIT $500,000, then I became a training cost for brand new pilot trainees. I didn't bother including the trips to the 'fuge, combat survival training, water survival training, annual life support training, OTS, SOS, etc.

Total AF cost to train Buzz? Around 8.5 to 9 MILLION dollars. Now, what other employer on this Earth pays 8.5 to 9 MILLION dollars to train 1 single employee and then drives that employee away from the employer by crushing him/her with .... insert your complaint here.... (additional duties, ancilliary training, 60 hour work weeks, miserable deployments, idiot "leadership," etc.).

Now, the ACP did not entice me to stay in, I got out and could not be happier. But, if the ACP would have been $50k a year, I would have seriously considered staying in. $50k a year extra to retain a 9 million dollar employee is chump change.

I think if the AF dumps the ACP, 90% of all AF pilots will run for the door.

The last paragraph of this article had me laughing out loud!

"The preponderance of the evidence suggests that ACP pay is unnecessary and that the Air Force could use the funds more effectively elsewhere. Specifically, it could apply money saved from stopping ACP expenditures to specific war-fighting policies such as increasing imminent-danger pay or recapitalizing equipment and facilities."

Talk about a grain of sand on the beach. There are about 1,000 other ways the AF could save hundreds of millions of dollars a year, if not billions.

1) Eliminate ASBC
2) Eliminate SOS
3) Eliminate the 12, 60" Plasma monitors that showed up at the Ops Group 7 weeks ago.
4) Insert waste you have seen here...

To tell you the truth, I hope the AF does dump the ACP. I guarantee, it will be back the very next fiscal year because pilot retention for the year without the ACP will be 6 to 9%.

Good Day!

USMCFLYR

Around the time that my first chance to get out came a calling (or my peers who had a little more seniority) the bonus didn't keep anyone from getting out. The airlines were hiring still and the life at the legacies especially were good. I remember a study showing that you could get out of the military all the way up until you were at 18 YEARS and still be better off financially because of the seniority accured at said airline and the what those two years meant in pay (now that seemed strange to me and I'm sure that all papers/studies can be manipulated to read what they what (think statistics)). Point being - I don't know anyone who took the bonus to stay in. I always considered it a 'thank you' from the military for staying.

Fast forward to the present day with the economy in the shape it is now and the prospect for flying jobs especially on the outside. I finally hear people at least contemplating staying in and taking whatever bonus is being offered at this time (which I believe is lower than the best I ever saw - $25k/yr for 6 years); and still some are getting out due mainly to QOL reasons and being forced into non-flying jobs (especially the dreaded IA billets).

Personally - I had planned to always stay until 20 years and retirement so I took whatever money they threw at me. Of course looking back on it now I even wonder if I didn't miss that golden opportunity that fell in my lap around year 16 when I look at the industry that I am getting into in one years time. Timing/luck/and who you know seems to be everything.

USMCFLYR

Cioran

Hahahaha--the giant plasma screen(s) in every squadron. No kidding. In addition to that you will always find 1 or 2 LT schedulers wasting their time creating some kind of excel wonder-spread-sheet to track this or that in some awesome new creative way ....below the plasma screen of course hung on the wall. Some things never change.

LivingInMEM

IF I was even remotely interested, I would do a paper proving what has been anecdotally proven here: the USAF needs to increase the ACP to make it effective. On a per unit cost, the USAF may be giving $25,000/yr mostly to pilots who are going to stay in, anyway.

If the current bonus only persuades 10% of the pilots to stay in, the unit cost is $250,000/yr/pilot retained. If you doubled the bonus and increased that rate to say 40%, the per unit cost would be $125,000/yr/pilot retained.

Year to year, you could keep adjusting the numbers until the desired results were obtained.

Of course, this type of actual, real-world analysis is beyond the scope of many in our Air Force. Besides, when our leadersip is changing jobs every 2 years and getting promoted based on not screwing up or upsetting their boss vs. making a positive impact in the long-term, what would you expect.

c17heavy

So true in every way.

milky

I'm about to have to decide whether to stay or go. I can definitely say that if there were no bonus, I would have already dropped my letter. The devil's money along with the retirement at 20 are about the only things keeping me from running as fast as I can. I still don't know if I won't take my chances doing something else (be it flying or going back to some professional schooling). I just know that without the bonus, I sure as hell would not put up with the optempo and excess BS that comes with DH in the Navy. Funny how the military is currently trying to save money by cutting down the bonus and retirement. I guess they don't like having the coveted retention they claim to be all about.

Fourgoslot

I don't know if you'd call it inflation or not, but when I was a LT back in '92 the bonus was $6,000 to get you to stay until the 14 year point (when the commitment was 7 years). I took the 20 year at $25K/year several years back. If it would have been $6K/year I would have declined and kept my options open. I was thinking a few years back I made a bad move. Now, with the industry the way it is, I think I'm lucky to be flying a Viper for $140K/year (even if I am living in Korea).

Check out the new bonus. They're offering $15K/year for staying past 20 (assuming you haven't made 0-6 yet.)

MoosePileit

Glass house, meet head full of rocks. I hope the author had a clue as to the joke he had published... (Tscha, as if.)

LivingInMEM

Uhhh, I doubt it. The sad part is that this thing had to pass some sort of peer review to get published in the Journal. I know when I published in a professional engineering journal in conjunction with my M.S. thesis, I got some serious input (sts) and questioning during the peer review. If there were any considerations that were left out, they brought them up and I had to address them for the editors to continue their consideration.

This paper covered only one (no, correct that,...based his ENTIRE thesis on just one) of a thousand variables that affect retention and it still got pushed to the masses. That to me is irrefutable proof that this publishing was more about political agenda than academic dialogue.

MoosePileit

He should spend time doing his job and not suckling Rand's teet wasting my tax dollars and calling it education. Nice ill-use of that relationship, good to see that hasn't changed. This guy will run the drone command someday. Now if they could just publish something by the author of the VSP.