How much do Traditional Reservists make?

[El Cid '95]

I have heard the term "troughing" in the Reserves a lot. What does this mean? How much can you make as a part timer? I am considering leaving active duty and going to a Resrve 135 unit.

 

[46Driver]

All depends on how much money your unit has available and if you are willing to take assignments elsewhere.

 

[dudemize]

Troughing means you have no other job and just pick up as many paydays as you can through the reserves. On the cargo side you can stay as busy as you want (at least for the forseeable future), probably same for the tankers. A lot of units are offering active duty orders for whoever wants them.

 

[flogged]

I just went through this thought process myself as I was deciding to Palace Chase a few months ago. I decided to pursue a slot with an airlift unit since, as dudemize mentioned, the work is there for whoever wants it (45/60/90 day orders if not activated--at least with C-17s). I checked out a few tanker units (all ANG) and it was very questionable whether or not you'd be able to pick up enough man days in any given month to make it work. Lots of furloughed guys bumming and not the same workload as airlifters.
If you're interested, the Hawaii ANG is converting to C-17s in about a year and they are starting to fill several positions in anticipation of that. If you'd like, PM me and I'll get you the contact info. They had interviews last month, but I opted out since I had good leads w/stateside C-17 units.

Flogged

 

[KC-10 Driver]

When I first left active duty in 1998, I "troughed" for 9 or 10 months until I got an airline job. During that time, I made as much money troughing than I would have made on active duty (maybe a bit more, given the oppurtunity for double pay days).

I was lucky, though. I was in a reserve associate unit (we share airplanes with an active duty wing), and there was an unlimited amount of man-days available to me to work in the active duty command post as a duty officer.

I worked a lot (I got paid about 28 or 29 days per month), but was home almost every night (or day, depending on what shift I worked), except for one trip every month or so.

The real bummer was having to pay out of pocket for my family's health insurance (pretty expensive in New Jersey).

Today, my unit has lots of troughers, and every single one of them (or at least those who want to) are on long term orders for one reason or another.

It's funny to think that we have a squadron with tons of unemployed airline pilots and airline pilot wanna-be's, and sometimes we have trouble filling our schedule because all the troughers are on orders doing something else.

For my squadron-mates who are on extended active duty, they all have Champus (oops, I mean Tricare -- showing my age) for the length of their order, plus for some time after.