Its rare that I chime in on this kind of topic, but I feel there needs to be a direct from the horses mouth truth represented here. 1. Arkansas Fisherman has a lot wrong with his post. He is displaying our base pay, which is our ONLY taxable income, which lends the appearance that we make pennies on the dollar to our civilian counterparts. Whats not displayed are the enormous “Allowances” we get as direct income. For example, my base pay as an E7 over 14 years is roughly $3400 a month, but thats all I get taxed on. My housing allowance which is not figured into that is $2500 a month, so now we have housing which is NOT paid for by my income. I have full health coverage for my wife and kids, but dont pay a dime into that. Still netting 100% of my base pay without paying for housing and medical which eats up most household incomes. Now, you add another $400 for basic allowance for services, my electricity and water just got paid, still not touching my base pay. So that leaves me with my base pay being almost 100% disposable income after essential bills are paid. Now lets go to tax season, I dont cross the minimum threshold to pay federal income tax and in fact I get the EIC, even though I net almost $95K a year in direct compensation. I havent even added hazard pay, jump pay, and other incentive pays which are out there. Now add that many companies are purely patriotic and love to take care of us vets, our cost of living is now lower. Thank you BCB for always taking care of me and my fellow vets. I see yours and other companies providing those discounts and incentives as a privileged by product of what we do, but it is in no way required nor “owed” to us.- Chaz