There’s countless answers to that question - everyone has their reasons.
I had the OCS talk with more than one officer when I was a junior enlisted. The issue for me really came down to jobs, and what I wanted to do during my career. As an enlisted Boatswain’s Mate, I could do all the jobs that I joined up to do, for as long as I wanted to do it. As an officer, I’d be doing jobs I know I’d hate - staff jobs, management and the obligatory headquarters assignments.* No thank you.
Some things are more important than money.
*Pilots seem to be an exception to this, and spend most of their time actually flying.
FWIW, this just happened to my XO. He’s pretty upset about the whole thing. I dont know how “short” the Army needs to be for it to happen, but it’s apparantly not uncommon at all. Also, a person cannot be gaurunteed his job out of OCS or the Academy or whatever training gave him his commission. They can fill out a “wish list” but it gauruntees them nothing. An enlisted soldier is given a contract that gauruntees his job.
A PL is a Platoon Leader. He is a 1st or 2nd Lt. This is where he actually gets to play combat officer and lead troops on the ground! I’ve gone through three PLs in the last YEAR!! Sucks to be them. . .
After that, the job get VERY administrative. Moreso at each promotion. The question of why a person doesn’t want to be an officer and get paid more, is analogous to asking the police office why he doesn’t want to take the promotion and get off the street. Well… it’s kinda similar anyway.
Oh, GT is an intelligence score based on - I think - math, word knowledge, and reading ability. Or some such similar thing. It’s part of the Line score results from the ASVAB entrance test for the military. With a GT of 110, I believe there is not a single job in the Army that a person is not qualified for. Infantry only requires like a 30 or something - which is about the Forest Gump level.
Whenever someone asks me why the hell I’m in the infantry with a 144. . . I tell them it’s cause I’m not a pussy.
The truth, though, is much more complicated and much more depressing…
I know I’m smart enough to go officer, I’m just not big on leadership. I’d rather be an enlisted technician and work on machines and computers and train others how to do the same than have to lead troops anywhere because I’d be really bad at it.
Besides, I already make about as much money as a Lieutenant with fewer headaches.
Thanks for clearing that up. I just remembered my ASVAB score from when I got to briefly look at my printout. I can’t for the life of me remember the line scores or how they were added up(though I did remember only those 4 sections really matter).
Years of study and experience has led “the Received wisdom” of the U.S. Army, at the highest levels - to believe the smarter soldiers make better soldiers. They have spent decades quantifying this to the extent they can. There is little doubt that if, they could, they would enlist the Harvard Class of 2006, before the class of the local trade school. (providing they could pass the PT tests).
Because the WWII experience showed that low IQ soldiers are almost impossible to train, impair effectiveness and are not cost effective - today those recruits that test out at the lowest 10% are never allowed to enlist.
The next lowest cohort (those above 80% but below 90%) have had strict numbers and controls placed on how many can be enlisted. The Iraq War has led to a (relatively) slight relaxing of just what this number is which has led to (take your pick)“hand wringing” or “rightful concern” within and outside the U.S. Army.
The answer to the OP is that this is definitely not the received wisdom
As others have said oneof the big reasons is the job. As an officer I couldn’t do my job and I like my job. The reality is that while being an officer does not equal “pencil pusher” it does equal “a lot of administration” and I simply don’t wish to be an administer. Of course, unfortunately as you advance in the enlisted ranks in the USAF you end up spending more and more time on administration and less and less time “at the job.” I put “at the job” in quotes because, at this time administration has become “the job.”
eleanorisby, since we’ve already established that I believe that you did not intend for that remark to be racist, you don’t have to convince me of that. So set that aside for a moment. I have “heard” you. Maybe you can “hear” me. I’m not going to try to change your language choices. I just want you to understand where I’m coming from (and maybe others).
You made assumptions and have had them challenged:
The racial meaning was secondary to you and some others; to some of us, it is the only meaning. There is nothing disingenuous about feelings. We keep telling you how we feel and you keep telling us that we “shouldn’t” feel that way.
I have too much history and associations with that phrase. I know the source. I know how it was used. I wouldn’t go back to using it anymore than I would more obvious words. Since it was born in racism, I am not going to “reclaim it.”
Then perhaps the misperception was not entirely on our part. For example, while I accepted your explanation of what the phrase meant to you, you continued to refer to our feelings as “disingenuous.”
That would be nice, but cultural differences exist from neighborhood to neighborhood and generation to generation. The more we understand differences, the more sense we can make of each other.
Having been on the enlsited side and the dark side I can understand someone’s desire to stay on the line and skip the staff junk and thusly stay enlisted.
However, it is best to just drop $ from any part of the arguement. You may make as much as an LT but the SGt Major of the ARmy hardly makes more than a CPT with just 4-6 yrs time.
In addition, isn’t it also true that senior sergeants or chief petty officers get paid more than freshly minted ensigns and second lieutenants?
I have no military experience whatsoever, but my impression is that much of the technical expertise is in the hands of NCOs, as well as the direct supervision of the troops.
A 1st Lt with less than two years in makes a base pay of 2783. It takes a Sergeant 10 years to start making that much money. But yea, after that, a SSG and above will make more than those new officers.
