Reserve Retirement & Regrets.

It dawned on me the other day that if I'd stayed in the National Guard, I'd have been able to start drawing Reserve retirement pay starting in late May.

Even though I was in the Guard for six years, I've never really been able to grasp how Guard retirement pay works.  I tried to look it up this morning, and learned that it's on a point system, one of those nifty military devices that has been around since at least World War Two in some ways.  The system by which soldiers who fought in the ETO were eligible to go home, for example, when the war ended was based on points.

Anyhow, there are some really useful net articles on this topic, of which this is one:

A Quick Overview of How Active Duty and Reserve Retirement is Calculated

What I ended up with, in the end, was this useful rough example, from the above:

The Final Pay Pension

Whatever max pay you find for that rank, multiply it by the service percent multiplier and round it down to the nearest dollar.

That’s your monthly pension.

For an E-7 with 2134 points starting their pension in 2016 it’d be $5061.30 * .1482 = $750/month.

Of course, you wonder how this applies to yourself.  I was an E5 when I got out, and would have had to have gone (and should have already gone) to the NCO Academy if I was to carry on.  Indeed, for the last half of my time in the Guard, I was in an E7 slot for much of that time.  

Had I stayed in, I would have gone to Officers Candidate School.  It would not have made sense not to, and I was eligible to do so.  One of my good friends from the Guard did do so, and he retired from the Guard as a Colonel after reaching age 60.

Without trying to really figure the math, I think I likely would have drawn, had I taken that course, and assuming that I didn't take a grenade in a street in Iraq or Afghanistan, would have been around $1,000 to $1,500 per month.

Not bad, but not enough to live on, which, of course for reserve service, makes sense.

Some reservists, I should note, draw considerably more and even approach Regular retirement pay as they have so many active duty points.  That would have made a difference, as our Guard units did serve in Afghanistan and Iraq, although not every soldier in the local units served in both. Some did.  Some did more than one tour in one of those countries, for that matter.

Here's a big thing, however.

All retired National Guard and Reserve members and their eligible family members may participate in a TRICARE health plan. You have access to certain services and health care benefits based on your age, retiree status, and location. 

• You may get care at military hospitals and clinics if space is available. 

• You remain eligible for the TRICARE Pharmacy Program. 

• You may choose to purchase dental and vision coverage through the Federal Employees Dental and Vision Insurance Program (FEDVIP).

That alone makes me wish I'd stayed in the Guard and gone to OCS.  I wouldn't be retired in the real sense now, but in real terms, I'd be a lot better off insurance wise.

Or so I say. At age 24, when I ETSed, I don't know that insurance was on my mind.  

Well, I know it wasn't.

I also know that our full time NCS who was our Retention NCO wasn't doing a good job.