I hate my ART job, I hate my ART job, I hate my ART job, but the money is not bad!
Mooseflyer-
I'm not sure of what your status is i.e. just coming off active duty or a reserve bum, but being an ART in my unit has seen much better days! We work 9 hr days with a 30 min lunch period so 9.5 hrs a day plus 1+45 hrs of commute which might not seem bad. You can use 3 hours of admin leave a week to work out. But watch out when you try to do military duty, that time card is something else, accounting for every minute and making sure you didn't get dual comp on something! And the work all day, fly night 16 hr day, leave at midnight and back in the office at 6 am gets old, week after week after week, not to mention the Dirty Dozen (work all week, weekend and back all week) like we'll be doing this weekend. But if you where working downtown somewhere, you'd have the samething, and I remember those days.
The furloughed airline guys in my unit that are ARTs can't wait for the day to get recalled or hired by another airline!! The career ARTs try to talk them and me out of it, but after my last 8 years as an ART, I can't wait for the day I leave the program and become a TR again! I miss my bum days!
Pros of the ART program- GS-13 (about 85K with bonus) to start plus mil pay (min run mil about 20K+) is what you can get which is much higher than the airlines starting pay. But as myself and a fellow ART where talking today, a Capt on Active Duty or AGR takes home about the same or a little more than us due to the taxes and has more time off. With that we'd love to be AGRs after it's all said and done and you can retire after 20 yrs verus the 32 yrs I'll have to put in for a retirement (age 50 for FERS). So the pay is not all it's made up to be, but you do get up to 5% match with the TSP which is not bad. As for your medical, you will have to make a small payment and your dental can be done with Tricare in the reserves. Alsoskip the life insurance and find something on the outside it's better and cheaper.
One good thing if you like to be home at night, you will, unless of course you are flying a local or on a week long trip. My unit has tankers so if we are not deployed, our typical trips are a week long, which is not bad.
But the big draw back for me is being there with nothing to do. We have a busy times, but when it comes down to it, you need to be there just in case something happens and time account for and that is what most of us in my unit feel we are there for, the just in case. I can get my job done in say 1-2 hrs and have the rest of the day off to BS, but I'm there for the "just in case" factor and that is what we really get paid for. I'd rather work hard for a week or two and then have the other week or two off.
Also from what I've seen over the last 15 yrs is that most of the career ARTs are those that could not make it on active duty and said yes to whatever the Reserve Command has asked them to do. They have no idea on how the Reserves or Guard work and would love to make it like Active Duty, which it is not! So you have that managment style to deal with.
So again, Moose, I'm not sure where you are and I hope your unit is not as f***ed as mine is now but that is my view of the program.
Also I failed to mention with this latest BRAC, since my unit is losing our planes, we were told that as "ART Officers" we'd be put in a pot and the Command would "offer" us a new position at a new unit and that if we didn't take it, "well that is where your food is so go if you want to eat"! Gotta love that! I'm looking for work elsewhere after that comment, thay can keep my job!!!
Best of luck with your choice. As a once to be career ART, it's a hard job to do and I'd say stick it out for the airlines, that's what I'm hoping for!
