Welcome to Radical Personal Finance, a show dedicated to providing you with the knowledge, skills, insight, and encouragement you need to live a rich and meaningful life now while building a plan for financial freedom in 10 years or less. My name is Joshua. Just recently on a Friday Q&A show, I had a caller who called in and asked what I thought about the idea of joining the military reserves, the army reserves, or the National Guard with the goal of gaining some experience, with the goal of having his career enhanced by joining that.

I gave my opinion, which was a quite vigorous and strong no, that I didn't think it was a great idea. A listener named Brian chimed in and said, "Whoa, I think, Joshua, you made a few decent points, but I think there's more to the story, especially in that situation.

Joshua, I think you missed a few important things." I wanted to bring him on and give him a chance to talk about it so we can give better, more fully rounded out advice. Brian, welcome to the show. I'm glad you're here today. Hi, thank you for having me. Just a quick background.

I've been in for almost 20 years now. I've done multiple different components. The army is made up of three different components, the active duty that everyone knows, the reserves, which is a federal reserve force, and then the National Guard, which are primarily state military forces. I've spent time in both the active component and the National Guard of the state, and in full time and part time capacity.

You feel like this has been a helpful experience for you, and you think that it's actually a very strong and valuable thing to consider. Tell me more. I think it can be very valuable and useful depending on what exactly you're looking for and what you're trying to get out of your military service.

If you just want money for college and you're trying to do the least amount possible to just get access to federal benefits, yeah, there are other ways to do it other than the military. That doesn't mean that you can't do it, but that might not be the best motivation for entering service, like you said.

If you want to work in particular areas where it is difficult or illegal to do so in a civilian capacity, then there are certainly options that are available to you through military or federal service that are not available to those who are not part of that service. What would be some examples?

I work at—oh, sorry, go ahead. No, what would be some examples of things where you literally couldn't get the job if you weren't involved in the National Guard or the military reserves? Some of these areas include, particularly, fields where you need security clearances. Those are very difficult to get outside of military service.

It's not impossible, but it is certainly more difficult and more time consuming. It is far easier if you're looking to work in a field that deals with classified information to do that via your military affiliation first. The colleague that was a defense contractor, I don't know exactly what he does, but if he has a need or an area where he would like to work in a certain field, or he needs a different or upgraded version of a security clearance, it will be much easier to do that through a military affiliation than through your private contractor affiliation because it costs them a lot of money.

If you're doing it through your military affiliation, it's much, much easier. That's a pretty niche application, but it is one of the circumstances that could affect that caller individually. Yeah, and because he mentioned—that caller mentioned that he was already working as a defense contractor, that could be a very important detail for his personal situation.

How else have you personally benefited significantly by your involvement with the National—with, let's see, Military Reserve and active duty? So from a personal perspective, I should have started off with all opinions expressed are my own personal opinions. They do not represent the views or positions of the Army, the National Guard, or the Department of Defense in any way.

So from my own personal point of view, I have found the mission and the work that we get to do to be much more satisfying than what I did in the private sector. So I did active duty for a while. I got out because I was a frustrated junior officer, much like Mr.

Reid. I did make sure to go back and read some of his articles. And I got a good paying private job. I was actually a supply chain manager of a large facility. I was making good money, but I did not find the job filling. I didn't find making money for other people and working that nine-to-five job to be meaningful enough.

So after several years of doing that, I looked for ways to get back into doing the military on a full-time basis again. That money was fine. It just wasn't fulfilling. I definitely prefer the fields where the work that you're doing has impacts on a national or international scale. And that's something I find hard to do through the private sector.

Again, that's not going to impact most people, but I have found that work to be much more satisfying. >>Steve: So obviously I said some pretty things that could be inflammatory with regard to the mission, the activities of many of the branches of the military, my frustration with military actions around the world, undeclared wars, questionable moral foundations for some of the wars, etc.

So my goal was not to be inflammatory with those things, obviously, but to state my perspective. But I think there is—but you, however, you feel like there is a higher purpose. You're gaining a significant sense of satisfaction from your work, and that's actually actively why you chose to go back into the armed forces.

Is that right? >>Jaymee Yes. And your positions, I don't think you're inaccurate. I mean, there have been many undeclared wars. They've all been undeclared wars. In a blue sky scenario, I would much rather have Congress reassert its authority to declare war. And if we're talking blue sky, then yes, I would also prefer a very small standing army with minimal—and the U.S.

has minimal overseas commitments compared to what we do now. But we can't snap our fingers and make that happen, and we are in the world that we are. And in that world, there are lots of places that being in the service allows you to impact things that you can't do from the outside as well.

You see in the news different events going on in Ukraine and China and other places, and you get to have some impact, depending on your job, in how those events play out and how you inform the leadership that does exist in the military and the political classes and helps inform their decisions that they make.

And hopefully, you can turn some of those decisions to be better than they would if you were not participating in that situation. Yeah. No, there's no question that—and this is kind of the classic moral conundrum, and I'm trying to be careful here. You're welcome to say anything that you would like to say publicly.

I'm trying to be careful in a public context not to ask you too many questions along these lines that could just potentially be difficult for you. But again, you're welcome to share any opinions that you have. The thought that I have on it is certainly, you want the good guys to be involved.

And so if you take the tack that I advocated, which was basically to abandon the "don't go and be involved in the military," then there is a risk that the entire organization is abandoned to people who may not have our best interests at heart. So that's always a risk.

The problem is, I guess, it's always a judgment of where are we in that cycle, right? Is this a redeemable organism? Same thing happens in any company, any church, any relationship, right? You look at it and you say, "Okay, I can be involved here, and is there an opportunity for me to make a difference in a positive direction?" But I'm not sure.

And so sometimes you just simply walk away. Sometimes you stay and you fight. And obviously, that's a personal assessment that everyone has to make. And you and I would probably make different assessments. You're saying, "I believe I can impact things properly here." And from an outside perspective, my having zero experience inside the trenches, I'm looking at it and saying, "I'm glad you're there.

I'm glad you're there. And I want to be faithful to raise as many good questions as I can so that you and others who are involved on the inside will look at it." But I look at it and I just don't see how the inertia seems too strong to me.

So that's, I guess, just a difference in judgment. Do you want to comment on anything I said there or add any personal opinions on those moral quandaries that I talked about? Well, just to start with, I don't find what you're saying to be inflammatory in terms of your positions.

There are examples of everything you've said that mostly, largely accurate. There are, the military is made up of humans. Humans do good and bad things. There's no universal brush that says all military folks are all heroes and they never do wrong and they should never be questioned. I don't agree with that.

And I don't think most people in uniform would agree with that. So it's perfectly okay to have positions that are not 100% raw, raw support groups. I don't think that's a bad thing at all. That's fair. That's fair. And I appreciate that. So with regard to other benefits, what other, so I actually, after I answered that question, that was a spontaneous response.

One of the things that I have admired over the years, I have thought that even from the perspective of early retirement, the military, and I guess the more traditional way that the pensions are structured, et cetera, can provide a remarkable foundation for the right people. I have outlines in my notes of a show that I've never done, but basically how to use the military for the purposes of basically building a foundation under yourself.

So join active duty as young as possible. You're getting training, et cetera. You have your housing expenses paid for. You have a very interesting job for the right personality. I personally think I would love to be in the military in terms of sense of camaraderie, working with my buddies towards a common project, all working together.

And so you have in many ways a very rewarding job mixed with a unique set of benefits, financial benefits, pension benefits, access to other programs like VA programs, lifelong health care, et cetera. I think there are some compelling ways that you could structure that kind of approach and use it very well.

Comment and give my listener that was considering, give him the strong case of ways that you've benefited by that and how he might benefit from considering joining even the Guard or the reserves. Well, if you want to go with a just straight financial calculations, and I know you've done the math on what a military retirement is worth, depending if you come in as an enlisted member or an officer, your pension figure is well in excess of seven figures between the time that you're likely to retire and the amount that you're likely to collect before you pass away.

And following that, half of it transfers then to your spouse who is, you know, women are on average, it's more likely to be a man joining the military. And on average, most women outlive men. So your spouse is then taken care of with a half of your pension until they pass away.

So from just a strictly retirement or remuneration, it is very, very valuable. Beyond that, by and large, we are well compensated for the most grades and most locations at this point, grade being your rank in the military. At this point, I am a more senior officer, and I feel that I am quite well compensated for my position at this point.

And most folks along the way, junior folks do definitely have a tighter budget, no doubt about that. We've all been there. But for the most part, your day to day monthly pay is quite good. You have a housing allowance, you have a food allowance. If you're an enlisted member, there's a clothing allowance to help pay for uniform and equipment costs.

Those benefits are quite valuable. On top of that, like you said, there are many other benefits, including education is always a big driver. So you've got what's called federal tuition assistance, which will pay for classes while you're in uniform and you can go to school at nights. If you get out, you then have new GI Bill, which is very, very generous.

That includes full tuition at schools and basically a stipend to cover living expenses. It's called a modified BAH percentage. So all that is quite valuable. And then from an insurance perspective, again, very valuable. I'll talk about it from a traditional drilling guardsman perspective for a second. You can get private health care through your employer because as a drilling reservist or guards member, you're only performing about one drill per week, one weekend per month ish.

I know that's heavy on the ish because there are some additional commitments that can come into play as well. But you can purchase that health insurance through your private employer and pay the full private rate for that. Or you can purchase what's called a tri-care reserve select plan, which is now I don't have the figures in front of me.

So forgive me because I'm sure they're going to be slightly off, but around $200 to $250 a month for full family coverage, which is a pretty darn economical choice. And there's a lot more like that. But those are some of the major incentives monetarily that do draw people into service.

- If you were going to choose to get out, what would be the things that would drive you personally out? What are those things that are at the back of your head where you think, "Okay, listen, I can deal with this, but this does kind of bother me. And if this became worse, this is one of those things that would cause me to choose not to re-up my enlistment." - So I'm actually an officer, so we don't have enlistment contracts.

You're free to go mostly when you want. I mean, you got to give some notice and get your release orders, but you pretty much can go when you want. Enlisted members do sign contracts, which do last a specified amount of time. Some of the things that would bother me would depend on what our military is being used for domestically more than anything.

Now being in the Guard, we do lots of domestic response missions, most of which are quite positive. We respond to wildfires and hurricanes. And I mean, from my day job, we help coordinate some of those things. And I've got pictures of our helicopters pulling people out of a lake when everything around them is on fire to save people.

And so there's a lot of good work that happens like that. But if politicians start trying to use those military assets in politically motivated ways, that would definitely be something that would be more or less a red line for myself and many others. - Yeah, absolutely. Last question I have, and then I'll just give you an open floor to say anything else that you want to say as we wrap this up.

Last question I have is this. Is it true, so if I sign up, and I appreciate your clarification, I did not know that officers did not have contracts in the same way that enlisted men do. But is it the case that if I were to join, say, the National Guard, which for me was attractive, right?

When I looked at it, I didn't pursue it, but I looked at it and I thought, "Ah, I would love to do this," when I was in my early 20s. If I were to join the National Guard, and if I were to join as an enlisted man, and I would have a contract, if I'm called up, including if I'm called up to go into combat, that I have committed myself to do that, right?

I don't have an escape clause. I don't have an out. And so I don't get to exercise the right of veto power. My veto power is simply whether I choose to join or not. And then if my commander calls me up, I have to go and do my job, regardless of my personal feelings about the specific circumstances.

Is that true? >>JAMES HENRY: The short answer is yes. The longer answer is more complicated. So in the National Guard in particular, most of our deployments that come up, they're well-known years in advance. And folks that really don't want to go will be able to transfer out of those units to other units, mostly.

Not everyone. I mean, say you have 70 or 80% of a unit that's more than happy to go. That always means there's some that don't want to. But for the most part, it is more or less voluntary in practice. Not by the letter of the law, but in practice, most people in a unit that mobilize do want to go.

So how's that for a wishy-washy halfway answer? >>ADAM: Well, I think it's fair. And as I was considering that question after the call, I thought, why would I-- I think from observation, it would seem to me that the single most powerful thing that happens in the military is you develop this sense of commitment to your unit.

These are guys that you've sweat with, you've bled with, you've served with, and you cannot help due to the simple circumstances. And it begins in the very beginning of training all the way through every single deployment. You cannot help but form an incredibly tight bond with people, with others, with whom you have served in any capacity.

It happens in every context, right? You go on a team-building weekend with your company, you build a tighter bond. You go on a short-term mission trip and build an orphanage somewhere, you build a tighter bond. You go and you serve in hurricane relief, you build a tight bond. You go and go to war, you build an incredibly tight bond.

And so you build this sense of dedication and loyalty to your unit, right? The men that are around you to whom you owe your life and you owe them a duty of care to them. And so that would be an incredibly powerful thing. And I think the degree of loyalty that I hear usually when I talk to people and just listen is often to their unit, to their commanding officers that are close to them.

I guess at its core, I lack any confidence in the highest levels of military leadership. I lack absolute, I lack confidence entirely in the commander-in-chief. I lack confidence entirely in the highest levels of military leadership. I don't think that these are not people that I admire. These are not people that seem to me like they're chosen for their outstanding effectiveness.

Rather they seem like they're chosen for their political savvy. And so at its core, being committed to a lifestyle of liberty, it's hard to imagine why I would sign up and voluntarily surrender my liberty to men that I don't admire or respect. And so I guess that, and since I'm unencumbered by the unit loyalty that is forged in the fires of training and deployment, then it's relatively easy from an outside perspective for me to see that like, why would I sign up for that?

But I think for a guy who's got some exposure to that, who has those relationships, that would be a harder thing to say. >>JAMES: I see your position and for a lot of people, that's the right answer. Not everyone should be trying to join the military and the question of who should and who shouldn't is a real question.

But in terms of that situation, political leaders are going to make good and bad decisions. And if I could make all political leaders make decisions I like, well, then I'd be king and that would be bad. But assuming that they will make decisions that will send my people into harm's way, would they be better off with me sitting on the sidelines or doing everything I could to help make sure that they come out the other side of it as well as possible?

And that's really the, I think that's a motivating factor for most people that are in positions of leadership because you care about those junior people and you want to make sure that they get the best care that's possible in terms of leadership, whether that's in combat or just rough situations.

>>COREY: Right, right. >>JAMES: May I comment for one moment on some of the senior military folks that you mentioned? >>COREY: Anything you like, anything, yes. >>JAMES: So I'm currently stationed out in the DC area and I've met and interacted with some of those folks that you've mentioned, like some of the members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

And for the most part, and this is not speaking for all of them uniformly, but for the most part, they are very intelligent people and very capable people. And for the most part, not politically motivated. Now beyond that, when we get to the political classes, that can be a very different thing.

But in terms of the senior military leaders, most are pretty decent. So levels of confidence, notwithstanding from your perspective, that's fine. But I don't know, most of the interactions I've had with them have been more or less pretty positive. >>COREY: Good, good. Well on this particular subject, Ryan, I hope that I am more wrong than right.

And I hope that there are many, and I'm glad and I really appreciate hearing your perspective. I'm so grateful that there are so many men and women who are serving with duty, with loyalty, with a clear moral compass, who are interceding and seeking to interpose on behalf of their troops.

I really, really appreciate that. Is there anything else that you'd like to say here on a public platform as we wrap up? >>ANDREW: No, Josh, many of the things you brought up are true. There are bad incidents that happen and there are good and bad people in the military and good and bad things can happen.

Everyone's individual experience will be different. You have to, if you're going to join, you have to look at what is the right kind of service and component for what you're looking for and what you'd like to get out of your military service. For me, I did the active duty army thing for a while and I found my real home in the Army National Guard.

That's the mission set and the people and the work that I... I think it depends a lot on each individual and what is going to be the best fit for them. There's no good one size fits all answer. >>STEVE: Agreed. Totally agreed. Well, Brian, thank you so much for reaching out to me.

I love that you did it and thank you for coming on and being willing to do this quick interview. I will continue to... By the way, for any other listeners, I love to be challenged. >>ANDREW: Still there? >>STEVE: I love to be challenged. Yeah, I'm still here. Hopefully you can hear me.

For any other listeners... >>ANDREW: I hope I didn't lose you. >>STEVE: I'm just going to mute you for a second here, Brian, while I finish up. I love to be challenged on anything. If you disagree with anything that I have said, I always welcome you to respond back. I always welcome you to let me know what you think.

Share your perspective and I'll frequently invite you, as you've been invited, Brian, on today. So, Brian, thank you so much for coming on. Thank you for your service and I pray that God would protect you and your men and may you be a force for righteousness in the world and a positive force for all of us.

We appreciate your work. >>ANDREW: Thank you. >>STEVE: Thank you. >>ANDREW: Thank you. >>STEVE: Thank you. >>ANDREW: Thank you. >>STEVE: Thank you. >>ANDREW: Thank you. >>STEVE: Thank you. >>ANDREW: Thank you. >>STEVE: Thank you. >>ANDREW: Thank you. >>STEVE: Thank you. >>ANDREW: Thank you. >>STEVE: Thank you. >>ANDREW: Thank you. >>STEVE: Thank you.

>>ANDREW: Thank you. >>STEVE: Thank you. >>ANDREW: Thank you. >>STEVE: Thank you. >>ANDREW: Thank you. >>STEVE: Thank you. >>ANDREW: Thank you. >>STEVE: Thank you. >>ANDREW: Thank you. >>STEVE: Thank you. >>ANDREW: Thank you.