thedrifter
03-12-07, 07:10 PM
Budget ideas would be bitter pills for troops
By Rick Maze - Staff writer
Posted : Monday Mar 12, 2007 18:52:43 EDT
A semiannual report from the Congressional Budget Office called “Budget Options” might as well be called “250 Ways for Lawmakers to Lose Re-election” — because that would almost certainly be the outcome if its suggestions were followed.
Among the ideas in the 2007 report, released earlier this week, is cutting veterans’ disability payments for all but the most seriously injured, making active-duty service members pay more than three times as much as they now do for the right to post-service education benefits, limiting annual military pay increases to 0.5 percent while paying bigger bonuses to people in critically needed skills, and charging more for older retirees who use the Tricare for Life insurance plan.
It is unlikely, according to congressional aides, that any of those ideas would be adopted by Congress. But some ideas in previous versions of the report have been adopted, particularly about reducing military retired pay and making military families and retirees pay a share of their health care costs.
In a few weeks, the House and Senate budget committees will begin writing their 2008 spending plans and will review the Budget Options guide in the process.
The nonpartisan staff that prepares the report does not make recommendations; it only offers the pluses and minuses of various budget initiatives.
Their pay raise options are an example.
Under current law, annual military pay raises are supposed to match average private-sector pay increases. The 2008 defense budget pending before Congress includes a 3 percent basic pay increase, effective Jan. 1, 2008, that would apply to all ranks and would match the increase last year in the Employment Cost Index, a measurement of private-sector wage growth.
The report says the military could save money if it used more bonuses and stopped providing comparable basic pay increases. It proposes limiting annual pay increases to 0.5 percent but increasing the use of bonuses, which CBO said would save up to $4 billion over five years.
Such a plan would allow the services to concentrate on paying more to the people they really need, while not spending more than necessary on the 40 percent of enlisted occupational specialties that are overstaffed, the report says. However, a downside is that it would call even more attention to the pay differences between specialties, which could cause morale problems, especially when supervisors make less than the people they are supervising, analysts admit.
Under another option, the government could save more than $1 billion the first year and $6.3 billion over five years by charging $20 for an office visit and $100 per hospital visit for Medicare-eligible military retirees using the Tricare for Life insurance benefit created in 2002, the report says.
Co-payments, even modest ones, would be a way to make beneficiaries aware of the cost of health care and are proven to hold down costs, the report notes. However, they also could discourage some people, those with low incomes or with chronic conditions, from getting all the care they need, the report says.
The report’s options about the Montgomery GI Bill education benefits program goes against the tide of congressional sentiment by proposing to increase the buy-in contribution required of active-duty service members. Many in Congress are talking about eliminating that contribution.
Since 1985, when the Montgomery GI Bill was created, service members have had to pay $1,200 — in $100 installments over their first year of service — to qualify for benefits. Monthly payments to service members have increased over time, from a maximum of $400 in 1985 to $1,075 today, but the contribution has remained the same.
The report suggests that the $1,200 contribution could be increased to $3,240 — collected in $135 installments over two years — so that members contribute the same 8 percent of the value of the benefits package that they did when the plan was created.
“The rational for this option is that if an 8 percent participant contribution was appropriate when the program began, it should be appropriate today,” the report says.
In the House, the armed services and veterans affairs committees are looking at updating the GI Bill, and are considering eliminating the fee. The biggest hurdle to its elimination is deciding what to do for the people who have already paid it.
Additionally, Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., has introduced a bill that would eliminate the $1,200 contribution for the duration of the global war on terror
Ellie
By Rick Maze - Staff writer
Posted : Monday Mar 12, 2007 18:52:43 EDT
A semiannual report from the Congressional Budget Office called “Budget Options” might as well be called “250 Ways for Lawmakers to Lose Re-election” — because that would almost certainly be the outcome if its suggestions were followed.
Among the ideas in the 2007 report, released earlier this week, is cutting veterans’ disability payments for all but the most seriously injured, making active-duty service members pay more than three times as much as they now do for the right to post-service education benefits, limiting annual military pay increases to 0.5 percent while paying bigger bonuses to people in critically needed skills, and charging more for older retirees who use the Tricare for Life insurance plan.
It is unlikely, according to congressional aides, that any of those ideas would be adopted by Congress. But some ideas in previous versions of the report have been adopted, particularly about reducing military retired pay and making military families and retirees pay a share of their health care costs.
In a few weeks, the House and Senate budget committees will begin writing their 2008 spending plans and will review the Budget Options guide in the process.
The nonpartisan staff that prepares the report does not make recommendations; it only offers the pluses and minuses of various budget initiatives.
Their pay raise options are an example.
Under current law, annual military pay raises are supposed to match average private-sector pay increases. The 2008 defense budget pending before Congress includes a 3 percent basic pay increase, effective Jan. 1, 2008, that would apply to all ranks and would match the increase last year in the Employment Cost Index, a measurement of private-sector wage growth.
The report says the military could save money if it used more bonuses and stopped providing comparable basic pay increases. It proposes limiting annual pay increases to 0.5 percent but increasing the use of bonuses, which CBO said would save up to $4 billion over five years.
Such a plan would allow the services to concentrate on paying more to the people they really need, while not spending more than necessary on the 40 percent of enlisted occupational specialties that are overstaffed, the report says. However, a downside is that it would call even more attention to the pay differences between specialties, which could cause morale problems, especially when supervisors make less than the people they are supervising, analysts admit.
Under another option, the government could save more than $1 billion the first year and $6.3 billion over five years by charging $20 for an office visit and $100 per hospital visit for Medicare-eligible military retirees using the Tricare for Life insurance benefit created in 2002, the report says.
Co-payments, even modest ones, would be a way to make beneficiaries aware of the cost of health care and are proven to hold down costs, the report notes. However, they also could discourage some people, those with low incomes or with chronic conditions, from getting all the care they need, the report says.
The report’s options about the Montgomery GI Bill education benefits program goes against the tide of congressional sentiment by proposing to increase the buy-in contribution required of active-duty service members. Many in Congress are talking about eliminating that contribution.
Since 1985, when the Montgomery GI Bill was created, service members have had to pay $1,200 — in $100 installments over their first year of service — to qualify for benefits. Monthly payments to service members have increased over time, from a maximum of $400 in 1985 to $1,075 today, but the contribution has remained the same.
The report suggests that the $1,200 contribution could be increased to $3,240 — collected in $135 installments over two years — so that members contribute the same 8 percent of the value of the benefits package that they did when the plan was created.
“The rational for this option is that if an 8 percent participant contribution was appropriate when the program began, it should be appropriate today,” the report says.
In the House, the armed services and veterans affairs committees are looking at updating the GI Bill, and are considering eliminating the fee. The biggest hurdle to its elimination is deciding what to do for the people who have already paid it.
Additionally, Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., has introduced a bill that would eliminate the $1,200 contribution for the duration of the global war on terror
Ellie