This option would also take some benefits, like housing allowances, into account when tying military raises to civilian pay raises.

The operational cost of the base averaged $2,000,000 monthly, the two highest costs being military pay (over $1,000,000 monthly) and civilian pay ($500,000 monthly).

But an administrative snafu meant several employees received full civilian pay while they were gone and had to return portions of their city salaries when they came home.

The gap between military and civilian pay is real, even with the help from Congress in the last two years.

However, by emphasizing that the civilian pay is much lower than that of officers, he does himself a disservice.

It seems to me that military and civilian pay in 1982 should have been comparable.

More important, military pay on average lags behind civilian pay for comparable jobs by more than 10 percent.

The strains have manifested themselves, Pentagon officials say, in things like cuts in training, shortages of parts for fighter jets and the gap between military and civilian pay.

The FY2011 Budget proposed raising federal civilian pay by 1.4% beginning in January of next year.

Freezing federal civilian pay at the current level for one year would save approximately $2 billion next year and $30 billion over ten years.