Research for sea pay

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Increased PERSTEMPO, Retention, and Navy Policy
July 1, 2003
CNA has been analyzing the retention implications of the post-9/11 period. This annotated briefing summarizes our findings and some ways to mitigate adverse effects, should they occur. Data from Desert Shield/ Desert Storm (DS/DS) show that attrition dropped during the conflict, particularly for ships deployed to the region, and then spiked following DS/DS. A previous CNA statistical analysis indicates that reenlistment rates dropped for sailors who experienced extra-long deployments before the Navy formalized its PERSTEMPO limits in 1986. Anecdotally, long deployments before 1986 were more routine in nature and not necessarily morale-boosting. Based on this analysis, we estimate that sailors may require between $220 and $345 per month to offset the retention effects of long deployments if PERSTEMPO rules continue to be broken. To offset any retention repercussions, we recommended two pays: Sea Pay Plus and a restructuring of the High Deployment Per Diem (or ITEMPO pay). Sea Pay Plus would compensate sailors for extra-long deployments. Our recommended restructuring of ITEMPO would compensate sailors for extra-long deployments and excessive cumulative time away. We recommend that the Navy (1) use Sea Pay Plus should retention drop in the near term, and (2) push for a legislative revision of the ITEMPO pay.
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Seabee Assignment Tradeoffs
January 1, 2003
Abstract:D7279 The Commander of Naval Facilities Engineering Command (NAVFAC) asked CNA to determine what type of compensation would target any existing or impending shortfalls in Seabee retention and manning. Currently, the Seabee community receives no sea pay and little deployment-related pay. This annotated briefing presents analysis of data from the Seabee Quality-of-Service Compensation Survey, which collected data on enlisted Seabees' preferences for aspects of sea duty assignments. Our results suggest that sea duty deployments are the most arduous characteristic of a sea tour, and that most of the perceived benefit from a decrease in sea tour length or a shorter deployment rotation cycle is from corresponding decreases in deployed time. To address the perceived hardship of sea tour deployments, we estimate monthly compensations that are larger, or more expensive, than estimates calculated in a companion paper: "Can Do" No More? An Assessment of Seabee Compensation, May 2002 (CNA Research Memorandum D0005212.A2). This suggests that a monthly pay of about $200 during a sea tour is a first step in addressing Seabee dissatisfaction and manning and retention shortfalls.
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Sailors' Willingness to Complete Sea Tours: Does Money Matter?
December 1, 2002
The Navy plans to rely on a new pay, Assignment Incentive Pay or AIP, to encourage sailors to volunteer for and remain in difficult-to-fill billets. To gain insight into its potential usefulness in keeping sailors in billets, we investigate the effect of sea pay--the Navy's primary distribution tool--on the willingness of sailors to remain or extend on sea duty. We conducted regression analyses quantifying the link between sailors' behavior and the sea pay they receive. Our best estimates indicate that an additional $50 per month in sea pay increases sailors' completing a year of an obligated sea tour up to 2.5 percentage points. Extensions are even more responsive to sea pay. In total, $50 more per month translates into 1,425 work-years of sea duty annually. At a cost of $31,600 per work year generated, using sea pay compares favorably to increasing endstrength. If an AIP of $50 per month had similar effects, our best estimate is that the Navy might receive a modest 300 additional work-years in the hardest-to-fill CONUS shore billets. Again, however, this is just one benefit to AIP. The combined benefits of getting sailors to volunteer for duty and keeping them there longer make AIP worth pursuing.
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Can Do No More? An Assessment of Seabee Compensation
May 1, 2002
In recent years, the Seabee community-the Navy's 'construction force'-has become concerned about its ability to retain skilled enlisted personnel. It fears that the Seabees' expanded mission, hectic deployment schedule, and harsh work environments have created retention and manning difficulties, which will worsen due to recent sea pay increases for seagoing personnel. In response to these concerns, NAVFAC asked CNA to assess whether an additional Seabee compensation is warranted and, if so, to recommend appropriate pay delivery vehicles. For mid- and senior-grades, the Seabee sea retention and manning environments are generally similar to or worse than those experienced by similarly skilled shipboard personnel. Yet recent sea pay enhancements are designed to address fleet recruiting, retention, and manning problems. As such, they will provide a "fix" for the problems facing the shipboard groups, but will not improve Seabee conditions since Seabees do not receive sea pays during sea tours. Providing the Seabees with a pay comparable in size to sea pay enhancement would cost $2.9 to $4.3 million annually, depending on whether it targets manning shortfalls or is equally distributed. The most promising near-term compensation vehicles for this pay would be an increase in the meals or incidental expenses portion of per diem for Seabees, whereas a long-term fix might require the implementation of a distribution incentive pay with targeted Selective Reenlistment Bonus.
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Navy Sea Pay: History and Recent Initiatives
December 1, 2001
The Ninth Quadrennial Review of Military Compensation (QRMC) is reviewing the role of the military compensation system in past recruiting, manning, and retention shortfalls in search of ways to better structure compensation to mitigate these problems in the future. A synopsis of sea pay is presented in this paper. First, the purpose of sea pay and how it has changed through the Navy's history is addressed: who has been eligible for sea pay and the size of sea pay relative to basic pay and to manpower expenditures. Secondly, sea pay as it has been used in the recent past is described including: the sea pay table; incentives; and, survey and actual behavioral data. Thirdly, reforms to sea pay currently being implemented are detailed, along with the Navy's objectives and options. Finally, the implications for a new servicewide deployment pay are considered.
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Do The Services Need a Deployment Pay?
December 1, 2001
The 9th Quadrennial Review of Military Compensation (QRMC) is seeking ways to better structure military compensation to alleviate current recruiting, manning, and retention shortfalls. Structured correctly. Basic pay and special pays should provide incentives to stay in the military, to gain experience and skills valuable to the services, and to move into critical skill areas or jobs where they are most needed. No existing pays fully answer the need to provide incentives to take on jobs that require serving alone, away from home. For this reason, the 9th QRMC is considering the creation of a new pay that would compensate service members for the hardships associated with deployments. The difficulty in creating such a pay, however, is establishing consistent definitions and measures of many of the key concepts related to time away from home. Relevant issues include: identifying the goals of any new deployment pay and the hardships for which people should be compensated; defining deployments and time away; and developing a deployment pay structure. Taken together or separately, these definitional and conceptual issues must be considered when determining the structure or use of a new pay and how it would relate to existing military pays. In a companion paper, we examine in detail the largest "away" pay, sea pay. Here we summarize that paper's conclusions regarding sea pay and examine several of the other special and incentive pays that historically have been used too compensate people for hardships associated with deployments. We then examine the availability of these pays to date and assess the adequacy of these pays in meeting the military 's goals. Finally, we conclude by outlining policy options and recommending compensation changes that would better align existing pays with any newly created pays and with the military's primary goals and objectives.
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