Congress Gets a Better Deal After 5 Years Than Most Enlisted Get After 20
The Gist:
Congress gets vested in a pension after 5 years that pays out at age 62 with TSP matching and federal health insurance access. An E-7 who serves 20 years gets about $3,000/month immediately in retirement—a congressman who serves 20 years gets about $5,000/month at 62, starting from a salary twice as high.
Meanwhile, these same members of Congress lecture veterans about being “too dependent” on service-connected compensation and push to means-test or cut VA benefits.
The piece calls out the hypocrisy: Congress would never accept having their own pensions means-tested or cut for “fiscal responsibility,” but they’re happy to apply that logic to veterans who actually got shot at for their benefits.
Bottom line: They set themselves up better after 5 years than most enlisted get after 20, then have the nerve to say we’re the ones getting too much.
You know what I love about Washington? Congress gaslighting veterans, pretending they’re all about having our best interests at heart. They only want to cut our benefits to help us. This is like my old man saying after he held a gun to my head, “I only did that cause I love you so much.”
It’s gaslighting and abusive. They lecture about veterans being “too dependent” on the government—really Representative, really Senator? You have set yourselves up with a better retirement package after 5 years in congress than most enlisted troops will ever see.
Let me give you the numbers.
What Congress Gets:
Serve 5 years, and you’re vested in a federal pension. At age 62, it starts paying out based on your high-3 average salary and years of service. The formula for members elected between 1984 and 2012: 1.7% of your average salary times your first 20 years of service, plus 1% for each year after that. There’s technically an 80% cap, but you’d have to serve 67 years to hit it.
A congressman who serves 20 years with an average salary of $174,000 walks away with about $59,160 per year starting at age 62. That’s close to $5,000 a month.
On top of that:
Thrift Savings Plan with up to 5% government match
Federal health insurance access in retirement (they pay premiums, but they get access to FEHB)
Social Security, like everyone else
No means testing, no questions about whether they “really need it”
What Enlisted Troops Get:
Do 4 years and get out? You get your GI Bill and if you were injured or suffered an illness you can apply for service-connected compensation and if you have proof it happened and treatment records showing a diagnosis and severity and it’s covered by law and the VA examiner agrees and the VA rater agrees you may receive some compensation.
Make it to 20 years and retire as an E-7? You’re looking at about 50% of your base pay immediately—around $3,000 per month. For enlisted, that’s 20 years of moving your family every few years, deployments, shift work, and whatever your body absorbed along the way.
If you enlisted after 2018 under the Blended Retirement System, you get TSP matching too—up to 5% of much lower pay. If you got in before that? You’re on the old High-3 system with no match at all.
Let’s Do the Math:
Congress: 5 years = pension at 62, TSP match, health insurance access
Enlisted: 4 years = GI Bill and whatever disability you can document through the VA claims gauntlet
20-year E-7: ~$3,000/month immediately
20-year congressman: ~$5,000/month at age 62 (starting from a base salary more than double what most enlisted ever make)
And Congress gets to keep working, collecting speaking fees, landing consulting gigs, lobbying—all while that pension clock runs. Troops? Most who separate before 20 get nothing but what they can prove broke during their service.
Now Let’s Talk About “Reform”
The same members of Congress who set up these benefits for themselves are the ones pushing to “reform” veteran benefits. You’ve heard the arguments:
“GWOT veterans are too dependent on service-connected compensation”
“We need means-testing for younger veterans”
“Let’s redirect benefits from working-age vets to older, more deserving ones”
“The system is unsustainable”
Daniel Gade testified to Congress that veterans receiving service-connected compensation are “increasingly dependent” and implied the system needs to be reined in. Others have floated means-testing proposals. The underlying message is always the same: you’re getting too much, and we need to take some back.
Here’s My Proposal:
Let’s apply their logic to Congress.
Junior members who barely hit the 5-year mark? Forfeit your pension. You didn’t put in enough time to “really earn it.” Redirect those savings to members with 20+ years who are “truly deserving.”
Left Congress and landed a $500,000 lobbying job? Means-test that pension. You don’t need it. We’ll save it for the members who are “truly needy.”
Make pension payments contingent on annual financial disclosure. If you’re pulling in six figures from the private sector, your government pension gets reduced or eliminated. It’s only fair, right? Fiscal responsibility and all that.
Sound reasonable?
Of Course It Doesn’t
Congress would never accept this. Suggest they take a haircut on their own earned benefits and you’ll hear about recruitment, retention, honoring service, and the dignity of having earned compensation through years of public service.
But when it comes to veterans? Suddenly “earned benefits” become “entitlements.” Our service-connected disabilities become “dependency.” Our compensation—often the only thing keeping us and our families afloat—becomes something they need to “reform.”
The Hypocrisy Is the Point
They write the laws that determine what we get. They hold hearings questioning whether we deserve it. They platform people like Gade who argue we’re too dependent. And then they vote themselves pensions after 5 years that beat what most of us will see after 20.
They thank us for our service while ensuring their own benefits are untouchable.
So here’s my message to Congress: Before you come for our service-connected compensation, before you float another means-testing proposal, before you question whether young veterans “really need” their ratings—take a hard look at your own pension plan.
Five years and you’re set for life. Most troops who do four years and get out have to fight the VA for everything they earned.
Thank you for your service, Congress. Now leave our benefits the f#@k alone.
This is a follow-up to “F#@k You For Your Service,” which examined the disconnect between the rhetoric of supporting troops and the reality of how veterans are treated by the system.