First, here is a link to a very good discussion on how the whole UPT thing works if you have not been doing a lot of reading lately.
http://forums.flightinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=16939
Second, here is a rewrite and edit of some of my answers from about four different threads from the past that should help you.
How do I get a full time slot in the Guard/Reserves or do I want full time employment?
It depends.
A little clarification on the Reserve assignment system. You can be assigned to a reserve unit as a member of the active air force. You still belong to active duty, they pay you, and you get another assignment at the end of your 3-4 years, unless you are separating from that assignment. Right now the 130 pilot system is a little over on new pilots, so guys from Corpus T-44 track are getting this good deal as their first assignment. You can leave active duty and go to the reserves early, but it comes at a price. This process is called Palace Chase. You agree to extend your commitment by some multiple, but serve it in the reserves. This is because you are no longer considered a full time servant and they want to get something close to the same amount of productivity out of you. Right now, if pilots can get released, the commitment is tripled. (It might be double for Navs) So if a pilot gets out 3 yrs early, he/she now must serve 9 more years in the reserves.
There are three types of slots in the ANG/Reserve: AGR, ART, and Traditional Reserve. AGRs are on active duty orders and are basically the same as regular air force. They are just getting paid by the reserves, and almost never get PCS'd and earn retirement the same as the active duty. ART (Air Reserve Technicians) are civil servants on the GS pay scale. Both of these don't come easy to someone walking into the unit just off active duty or straight out of flight school. Usually they go to people who have been around a while. These people are there everyday; and run the unit, take care of training requirements, and get airline guys recurrent when they have been away on vacation or at their real jobs for long periods of time. Everyone else is called a traditional reservist. These are the often mislabeled "weekend warriors." You only get paid when you work. I won't go into the pay system because that alone is a separate novel. I will say as an aircrew in this busy world where the reserve component makes up over 40% of the airlift/tanker force, you can make plenty of $$ doing this and not have another job. This is called "bumming" in the guard and "troughing" in the reserves. Budget plan for 50% of what an active duty person at your paygrade earns, and expect to earn 75%. If a unit is short handed they may reduce the pay grade on one of the civil servant slots and put a young guy into a scheduler type position that doesn't require an instructor pilot/nav. Ask if you are interested, because you never know what may come your way.
A lot of people coming off active duty not understanding the pay system, think they want full time jobs for the security. But they really torque the leadership if they sold them on why they should hired full time, without revealing intentions to seek airline employment. It takes a hard sell to walk into a full time slot from outside the unit, and they must really need somebody to fill that slot if they are willing to take an outsider. So using that job to hold you over, then blindsiding the leadership with two weeks notice after obtaining an airline job is not cool.
Some people like what they did on active duty and want full time jobs, but don't what to move anymore so a full time reserve job offers that.
Some people take military leave after they get hired by an airline and finish probation for a 3 year full time AGR(Active Guard Reserve) tour or ART job with the reserves, because they make more money at their current military salary than the first couple of years at their company. They go back to their company with a better schedule due to higher seniority, equal or better pay, and did not sacrifice as much precious family time.
There are people who like the traditional reserve position. They can run their own business, if they are not airline guys. They love military flying and aren't ready to give it up, but want to do something else in life. Unemployed guys seeking employment can control their lives while spending time with the family, but keep current in flying and pay the bills. (I recently took a six week vacation to do spring chores and spend time with the family) A flyer can make 75% take home (with per deim from TDYs included, if they don't spend it all) of what a person on active duty at the same rank makes just in regular pay with no TDYs. Personally, I budget plan for 50%, so I don't extend myself or get into a position of really needing that last trip that always seemed to get cancelled.
Some of this depends on family situations. People with families need health care. If their spouse doesn't work or get a good health plan through his/her job, then they desire the full time slots, because those off the shelf family care plans can be quite expensive. Traditional reserve positions have no health care plans. You the flyer, may have some benefits depending on what type of pay status you are on while performing duty on a particular day, and depending on how long you have been on that status. If you go on active duty for more than 30 days, then your family is covered just like someone in the Air Force, but before that point only you are covered.
Lastly, it depends a lot on the job market. Now, there aren't too many full time jobs available. When the market bounces back, there won't be as many people seeking those slots.
How flying can you do in the Guard/Reserve?
About 40% of the tanker/airlift capability is in the ANG/Reserve and the Air Force totally integrates these assets into the day to day flying operation. A guard/reserve tanker may get a tasking to refuel active duty fighters, bombers or transports at one of the many school houses around the country. Or they may go support a guard fighter unit to keep their dudes current on aerial refueling ops. Everybody has to maintain the same currencies as an active duty pilot in each particular airframe. Sometimes airline guys go non-current, then the full time Instructor Pilots get them recurrent, but that doesn't relieve them of the number of approaches, landings, airdrops that must be flown in a quarter/half/or year. I don't know about fighter currencies only 130s and T-37s.
Big AMC(Tankers, 141s and C-17s) does a lot of work for dudes called the TACC (Tanker Airlift Control Center)at Scott AFB, IL. They get a tasker and send a crew out to Europe or the Pacific for at least a week at a time. Tanker units deploy on rotations with other active, guard and reserve units to support the missions in Bosnia and the desert.
Little AMC (130s) work mostly for the ANG Bureau or the Reserve Bureau and spend lots of time hauling Army Guard units or other AF units to their so called "summer camps." Some of these units go to Europe for their two weeks of training. Sometimes you'll fly to Ramstein with a stopover in the Azores with a load of dudes, take a day off in Germany, return empty, and ten days later do the same trip in reverse when it is time to pick them up. Then there are the ongoing missions in Bosnia, Coronet Oak in Puerto Rico, and the never ending desert rotations.
Bums in the ANG or troughers in the Reserve in the 130 world can usually get 300 to 500 hours per year depending on willingness to take bad deals in order to get good deals and be the scheduler's "never say no to" any trip person.
Deployments in the 130 Air Reserve Component (ARC=ANG/Reserve)
Deployments in the ARC are typically done on a volunteer basis. This changes during wartime when the full unit may be activated.
The three big deployment for the past few years have been the South American rotation flown out of Howard AFB, Panama and now San Juan, PR; the Bosnia/Kosovo mission flown out of Ramstein Germany, and the desert mission to Southwest Asia.
San Juan is done by an ARC unit for two weeks at a time and is usually a 4-6 plane package with the maintainers, and admin staff to support that. Usually, you fly a day, then have a day off. This was a good deal in Panama, and a probably a better deal in PR, because it is now easier for your spouse to join you in Puerto Rico, rent a car and have a hotel room than it was for her to fly to Central America and do that same stuff. In the last few years, the active duty guys started joining in on this one and may take it for longer periods of time.
The other two deployments are 90 day rotations and are also shared by the active and ARC. The guys from Pope, Dyess and Little Rock have two squadrons, and they may split the deployment for 45 days each between two squadrons. Because the ARC is done on a strictly volunteer basis and most people have civilian jobs, there is no way a unit can support a 8-12 plane package for 90 days. Units will join up with units who fly the same series of planes with same avionics so everybody can fly each others planes or fly with a mixed crew of guys from different units, and send two or three planes per unit. People rotate in and out every two weeks for the length of the deployment. Unemployed guys may take longer times if they need the money. I got 30 days anytime I ever asked for it, and got 60 days continuous quite a few times.
I am fairly certain the tanker units do business the same way for the deployments they support. Right now the deal for them seems to be the one that goes on in the south of France supporting both Bosnia/Kosovo and the desert deployments.
As one who has been in both reserve components, I would recommend the Air Guard over the Air Force Reserve if I had to choose between the two.