[pepsionice]

Back around 2004, I stood within a military office and noted that some E4 I worked with...who was preparing to buy a $45,000 car. I asked about the down-payment....he and his wife worked...and they were putting down $10,000. This was to be a four-year loan ($775 roughly for each month). The thing that bothered me....the two had another loan for another upscale car (paying around $500 a month on it). It’s a heck of a lot of debt and you can’t afford to have any emergency occur.

[Red Badger]

[oh8eleven]

Back around 2004, I stood within a military office
In 2005, I revisited Camp Lejeune where I had spent a year ('68-'69).
  The base was essentially the same with one noticeable exception.
  There were new parking lots EVERYWHERE you looked, and the vast majority were filled, primarily by new PU trucks.
That's when I stopped believing that the troops were vastly underpaid ... a claim you still hear today.