Update--Off Topic: CBO Says Military Regular Compensation Higher than Federal Civilian Compensation.

Update--
Officer Level Compensation Comparison Groups
To clarify, for the officer level vs civil service compensation comparison all officers with two years experience were included while civil service group selected only included college graduates. These groupings were apparently selected because report noted that almost all military officers are four year college graduates.
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New CBO report is HERE; graphs on pages 7 and 8 show comparisons for enlisted personnel and officers. CBO's conclusion: 

For any given number of years of work experience, median cash compensation for enlisted personnel was at least as high as the 75th percentile of earnings for federal workers with comparable work experience. In other words, the typical enlisted person receives more cash compensation than three-quarters of comparable federal civilians...for commissioned officers with two years of experience or more exceeds the 75th percentile of cash compensation of federal workers with four-year college degrees .. That disparity between officers’ and civilian employees’ cash compensation grows with increasing years of experience, and the disparity for officers exceeds the disparity for enlisted personnel.

Non cash and deferred benefits were NOT included in the comparison; If these costs were included, relative military compensation would be even HIGHER: 

[for the military]...the value of noncash and deferred benefits adds 100 percent to cash compensation....noncash and deferred benefits [for civil service members] add about 55 percent to the value of cash pay, or about half as much as military personnel receive....Survey data collected by the Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) in the national income and product accounts suggest that noncash and deferred benefits add about 75 percent to the cash pay of military personnel and about 50 percent to the cash pay of federal civilians.

(Of course, there is that other military /civilian difference of overseas deployment, separation from your family, and getting shot at and blowed up).

Originally created and posted on the Oregon Housing Blog.