On Friday I found myself in an oversize hangar with an even more imposing C-17 Globemaster cargo plane sitting outside of it. Prime Minister Mark Carney made his way to Canadian Forces Base Trenton to fill in the details of the boost of two billion Canadian dollars that will be given annually to the military’s payroll.
The increase in wages is a key part of Mr. Carney’s ambitious promise to raise Canada’s military spending to NATO’s minimum level of 2 percent of the country’s gross domestic product by April. It’s also one of those rare issues that are largely supported across the political spectrum.
The pay raise was not, however, precisely the 20 percent increase that David McGuinty, the defense minister, suggested was coming in June. Pay for the lowest ranks — the majority of members of the forces — will indeed rise by 20 percent. But higher ranks will receive lower increases.
The annual base pay for the lowest-ranking members of the military currently ranges from 43,368 Canadian dollars to 63,648 Canadian dollars, depending on class.
Mr. Carney suggested that the differences in the new pay rates were an attempt to narrow discrepancies in pay between ranks.
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The post A Pay Raise for Canada’s Military to Boost Recruitment and Retention appeared first on New York Times.
