The US Marine Corps will offer up to $210,000 to stay in the service for six more years, in an attempt to keep them from leaving for commercial airlines.
Fixed-wing, rotary and tilt-rotor pilots could see a lot of new incentives to stay in come Fiscal Year 2019, with more details to follow in a release, which was signed by Manpower and Reserve affairs commander Lieutenant General Michael Rocco on Friday.
“One of the things I’m pretty excited about is that we gave them options,” Rocco told Military.com. “We gave the [officers] choices … where if they want to, they can sign up for two, four or six years.”
The bonuses will be targeting O3s and O4s in a slew of pilot positions, as well as MV-22 Osprey pilots with 11 years in uniform. The latter could receive an extra $30k per year, totaling to $120,000.
Rocco said that it was important to incentivize all pilot roles in some fashion, as leaving some jobs would would be crippling to morale.
“That’s a terrible environment to be in, where somebody’s basically doing the same job…and [one] gets a bonus and you’re not,” he said. “Here, there is a bonus for everyone.”
Many Marines leave for the commercial sector, but ultimately it isn’t always a monetary issue when it comes to staying in the Corps.
For Colonel Sean DeWolfe, it’s simply a point everyone reaches (usually around the 10-year-mark), where every Marine must decide to stay or leave.
“I didn’t stick around because there was a bonus. I wanted to be around Marines, and a bonus just happened to be there,” he said. “I have acquaintances though where the bonus did keep them in…because at that point, it becomes a business decision when you reach that crossroad.”
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