[redpoint5]

Originally Posted by Xist

If I joined the Army right out of high school and only promoted fast enough to avoid being maxed out at my pay grade, I could have been a Sergeant First-Class two years ago earning $4,566.60 a month or $54,799.20 annually, and I could have retired with half of that, or $27,399.60.

That is about what I earned last year.

If, for some reason, I stayed in for forty years, I would need to reach the rank of Sergeant Major to continue receiving raises. A Sergeant Major with forty years of service would make $8,241.82 a month, $98,901.84 annually, and would retire with 100% of that.

Fifty-eight years old and making almost $100,000 a year in retirement, plus you would have forty years of free room and board.

One of my exes said that if you just showed up to KFC every day, on-time, and did your job, after six months they would make you shift leader, with a small raise. Let's say that you start when you are sixteen, in theory, when you graduate, you could be a manager.

Switching to McDonald's just because they are supposed to have great management training, Indeed.com says a manager makes about $13 an hour.

Crap.

You can graduate from high school, get fingerprinted, take CPR, First Aid, a few other courses, and my agency would pay you $14 hourly to help kids read good and stuff.

Good luck getting forty hours a week, though.

It seems like there are far better options for making at least $13 an hour, but I am sure that once you get above Store Manager the pay gets better and better. If nothing else, you can take your management experience and go elsewhere.

I do not have any leadership experience.

I spent the weekend a couple weeks ago with my brother-in-law that retired from the Air Force almost 2 years ago. He recently turned 50. One of his last assignments was base commander on the CA coast. I forget what % 30 years of service earns in retirement, but he's making something like $80k/yr in retirement. I don't know if disability is part of that $80k or not. His private job last year earned $300k. He took his RV to Montana to fish this week.

I've got no military experience (to my dismay), but it seems like it provides a good opportunity to earn a living through retirement.

The factory I worked at would hire temps (just about anyone that can pass a drug test) and pay them $14/hr to start, and after about a year of good attendance would hire people directly and pay $16-$18hr with benefits and built in overtime (with optional overtime for those that wanted it). I saw people go from new hires, to engineers, to department managers there.

Pay isn't the only consideration. You exited the military for your reasons, and you got into speech therapy for your reasons.