Less money in your paycheck, while paying more housing costs out of pocket.
Higher costs for Tricare while also spending more for groceries at the commissary.
This all could become the new normal for service members and their families, if the Joint Chiefs of Staff gets their way.
The top officers from each branch of the military will take their case to Congress in May, in a special hearing in front of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
They plan to argue that if they don't cut pay and benefits for service members, then military readiness will be reduced.
Over the next five years, they want to take away more than $30 billion from troop compensation, to avoid more defense cuts to weapons, technology and acquisition programs.
Military families and veterans advocates are opposed to it, saying it’s just a way for Pentagon brass to save their expensive pet projects, like the F-35 program.
The Joint Strike Fighter is already the most expensive weapons program in history, and this week, updated cost estimates show the price tag is rising by $7.4 billion dollars, to a total of $398.6 billion.
Now the decision is up to lawmakers whether to invest in technology, or troops and their families.
