Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-03-04
BY DONALD A. CRAIG.

In the pay increases which it has rec
commended the Interdepartmental Pay
Board has included every grade from
private to major general in the Army
and the corresponding grades in the
Navy, Marine Corps. Coast Guard, Pub
detic Survey.
The total increase in the appropri-
ations for these six services, if the pro-
posed pay schedules were in effect dur
ing the present fiscal year, would be
26.75 per cent, or $85, 684, 706 above the
aggregate appropriations required under
the existing law, according to an esti-
mate by the Budget Bureau.
Specifically, the board has included in
its recommendations for pay increases
commissioned officers, warrant and
commissioned warrant officers, woman
nurses, enlisted men, the entire retired
personnel and the National Guard and
Reserve forces when on active duty.
Throughout its report the board has
employed the Army titles which are
understood to cover the personnel OF all
services in the corresponding grades.
Allowances Would Be stopped.
One of the most radical changes pro-
posed is the discontinuance of rental
and subsistence allowances for COM
missioned officers. The board recon-
mendS that these allowances be con-
solidated with pay into a single item,
which shall be merely designated pay"
When Government quarters are fur
nished to an officer it proposes that a
rental value shall be deducted from his
pay. This is the opposite of the present
system.
The board believes that officers should
be paid upon the basis of their earned
salaries" rather than in accordance
with the theory of the Giving wage"
"The only complete and perfect Sys-
tenn Of paying an officer according to
his living expenses" declares the board,
would require every officer to submit
budget, to be approved by competent
reviewing authorities, and his emolu-
ments fixed thereby. This is obviously
impracticable.
Furthermore, the procedure neces-
Sary. to establish the right of the mar
ried officer to receive the allowance for
dependents has become so formidable
and SO inquisitorial as to cause intense
dissatisfaction among this class of off,
GERS. The attention of the board has
been called to several cases (and there
are doubtless many others where the
officer has foregone this allowance
rather than expose his dependent
mother to the humiliation of laying be-
fore the public in an official document
such intimate details of her life as re-
quired by the form devised by the
controller general for the establish
ment OF dependency in such case.
Value Held Pay Factor.
Sound logic requires that an officer
should be paid for. his value to the Gov
eminent, without regard to his family
status, not for his expenses of existence,
and simplicity of administration requires
that the amount granted him be con-
sidered as pay and not a complex mix
ture of pay and varying allowances "
The increases in appropriations under
the proposed pay schedules for each
service, as estimated by the Budget Bu-
reau on the basis of the 1880 strength
Of each service. would be as follows:
Army, SAC, 147,571, or 1904 per cent;
National Guard, $3.986, 1886, or PATTI per
cent; Organized Reserves, 81 ,375, 965, or
80 per cent; making total increase for
the War Department of $45, sos, 1921, or
30.49 per cent.
Navy, including Reserves, $S2 500 900.
or 2432 per cent.
Marine Corps, including Reserves, 3d.
407 ,296, or 21.38 per cent.
Coast Guard, $3,455, 450, or 1919 per
cent.
Public Health Service, $5Ss,O25, or
30.61 per cent
Coast and Geodetic Survey, 1929, 041,
or 4018 per cent.
These figures do not tell the story of
how the proposed increases will affect
each grade in the six services. That is
all worked out carefully and set forth
in detail in the report of the interde-
partmental board, and will be explained
in later article in this series.
History of Legislation Studied.
The first thing the board did before
working out the proposed new pay
schedules was to study the history of pay
legislation in the various services and
then formulate statement of prin-
ciples which it "deduced from its study
of prior and present legislation, from its
knowledge of conditions in the services
and from its collective experience i'll the
military services, upon which principles
it is believed any service pay legislation
should be based so far as practicable"
Before setting forth this set of prin-
ciples, however, the board said that
complete conformance to them could be