Military Compensation Quotes

It is our responsibility as Americans to provide for the families of those who have died to defend our nation. Raising the military death benefit is not a Democrat or Republican issue - it is an American issue.

The all-volunteer army works. It works particularly when we pay our troops well.

Not much over £1,000 a month for the private soldier on operations is hardly an impressive figure.

We would take a little bit of money out of a huge increase in ballistic missile defense and put it in a place where it will do a lot of good, namely, in targeted pay increases to our enlisted personnel, particularly our NCOs and our junior warrant officers.

I always want to make sure we protect our soldiers' pay if there is a shutdown of any kind.

But I think what we're coming to grips with is the fact that we actually have a mercenary Army, and it doesn't have a nice ring to it. We call it 'volunteers', but we're basically paying people to serve their country. And if you're going to pay people and have a mercenary Army, you're going to have to pay the market rate. And so the bounties are going up—more money for tuition, higher enlistment bonuses—and I think it's appropriate.

I think it's criminal how little people in the military are paid. These are people out risking their lives, taken away from their families for long periods of time. I think they should be paid dramatically more than they're paid.

It is unacceptable that disabled veterans in Illinois rank at the bottom of the list when it comes to disability pay. We owe our disabled veterans more than speeches, parades and monuments.

It's outrageous that many enlisted people qualify for food stamps because military salaries are so low.

We do thank our men and women in uniform. And I thank them. I thank this House today that approved a bill that will allow for a pay raise for our military. We are grateful for that and for the actions of this body.

Military pay has been allowed to lag behind to the point where career enlisted men with families to feed have been forced to resort to food stamps.

Our men and women in uniform put their lives on the line for our nation every day; they should not have to jeopardize their financial well-being as well.