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Road to 350: What Does the US Navy Do Anyway?
- Thread starter Randy Daytona
- Start date
exNavyOffRec
Well-Known Member
Were the MSC crews under the COVID shot mandate and if so I wonder how much of a factor that is in this shortage?
That's a fairly absurd proposition to just toss out there without any idea about whether it's true or not.
Haha. @exNavyOffRec , go ahead and pull up the RFK jr yardsigns, as he's dropping out of the race today...I'm sticking with Jill Stein however. 😁
I believe they were. They were also subject to the same port entry craziness that the rest of the Fleet had to deal with (Not being able to go into port, being restricted to the ship, etc.) which killed their morale as well.
I think MSC also does a piss poor job of recruiting. They have a LOT of great benefits and I think they really rely on word of mouth in Fleet concentration areas and prior-Navy accessions to fill their ranks. They really need to do a better job of getting the word out. Weekend duty hits different when you're getting an extra $250 in pay just for the inconvenience.
A lot of those restrictions weren't even Navy ones but ones enacted by countries.
Mobilized with a former MSC engineering officer, said anything outside his 8 hours of duty a day were overtime and he made a killing as it was an old ship.
Met an MSC captain (USMMA grad) at an airport bar once. He seemed to have a LOT of disposable income. Paid for over $100 of drinks and tex mex food for me when he learned I was in the Navy.
Yes, I'm aware but there were a lot of Sailors and CIVMARs who made the decision to pop smoke after that.
They make very good money. You get all of the hazard pay that military Sailors get but then they also get overtime, inconvenience pay for working on holidays/weekends, and even have special incentive pay. Their normal schedule is 4 months on, 4 months off, but if you work longer than 4 months then you get extra pay. I knew one of the stewards (Think FSAs, wait staff, and kitchen assistants) who worked nearly year round because she was able to make mid $100k with only a GED and was saving up to put her daughter through college. I was amazed at how good her pay and benefits were.
Yes, the pay is very good and you're a government employee so you get all of those benefits on top of that like a pension. It's a pretty good gig if you don't mind being at sea and away from your family. You can live just about anywhere as they'll fly you out to the ship as is typical for the industry.
And don't forget. For some that is payback for an excellent free education at the US Merchant Marine Academy. Alternatively they could have met their payback obligation working at a Marine Architecture firm and made even bigger money without going to sea. The local USMMA Admissions liaison (BGO TYPE) took that path.
exNavyOffRec
Well-Known Member
It was strictly a question as there were some opposed to the shot that decided to sacrifice their jobs, not saying it was right or wrong for it to be required. Personally I don't understand why a person would risk walking away from their job for something that had a tiny risk, but we all know people that did.
There were certain government employers that were hurting prior to that requirement that now have a bigger hole to dig out of as their retention and recruiting wasn't going well before COVID, Washington State Patrol and Washington State Ferries are the 2 I know fall into that situation.
I understand the question. It just seems improbable that a significant number of people would have been impacted by that, given what we know about those numbers in a very similar cohort in the AD Navy.
exNavyOffRec
Well-Known Member
I am not saying it would be enough to cause 17 MSC ships to be sidelined at all, in fact I doubt it, however given how MSC ships are staffed it doesn't take many to leave to cause a shortage on a ship or two, then add in people leaving for better pay, retirement, and many other reasons to result in the 17 ships being sidelined. I am sure MSC has a breakdown of who has left for what reason so they can figure out how to correct the manning shortfalls, just like any other large organization.
I'm also not saying that the number of MSC crew that were killed by being hit on the head by a meteor were enough to cause the ships to be sidelined, but I do wonder how much of a factor that was in the shortage.
I'm not trying to beat you up over this, it was just a really weird way to frame the issue in an unnecessarily provocative way. I know that wasn't your intent. I still love you.
