Are the Astronauts paid a salary? I am thinking that all of the personnel that are members of the Military, are being paid their normal military pay, maybe a bonus on top of that? The civilians, on the other hand, certainly aren’t going into space without some compensation. Who writes the checks, and how much is it worth to risk your life in outer space?
There a time clocks on space vessels?
I remember reading in a Time Life book that astronauts were complaining about being underpaid because the clock on the space ship had counted slightly more time than the one on Earth because of relativistic physics, so I guess they get paid by the hour.
I think the astronauts get some sort of hazard premium that ups their pay significantly when training and flying. Beyond this, as a practical matter, most astronauts are so far into the upper end of the human ability and intelligence (and education in some cases) bell curve that most would be easily able to command 6 figure salaries in the real world once they become civilians. It’s a labor of love.
It’s amazing sometimes how inflexible the pay system for Federal employees can be: certain boxes are checked, certain pay grades result. And there’s no real official way to go outside the system. There are alternate personnel systems (I’m in one of them), but they still can’t go outside the boundaries set by the GS scale.
Military astronauts probably get extra ‘hazard’ pay the way any other pilots do.
But I bet it’s all a moot point. Who’s gonna complain about the pay? I’d do it for free, ad I’m sure there are plenty of people out there who feel the same. Hell, I’d let the government keep my paychecks for a couple years if they’d make me an astronaut in the meantime instead of a lowly engineer.
Hell yeah!
You kinda strike a chord with me: I don’t mind lowered pay–I’m a military engineer, and get to travel to more places than civilians. Astronauts and military, we get our perks.
Tripler
I still wouldn’t mind floating around in space (especially if it’s like the closing end of Moonraker).
FYI, the range of GS-11 to GS-14 is $45,239 to $99,053.
People compete very hard to be in the Space program. They are not as worried about the money track as a business major would be.
There are now people lining up to pay $200,000 each to go into a brief flight on the Virgin Galactic space ships.
It is a honor and a privilege to be allowed to risk your life to go into space as an Astronaut.
Yes I know Virgin is only sub-orbital.
Heh, even as a civilian, I travel far too often to far too many places I don’t care to go. (That’s why they’re called “orders,” right?) I wouldn’t complain so much if I could list my TDY location as “LEO”. 
I hope the hazard pay makes it much higher; I think they deserve it. It’s risky business.