Posted on Jan 6, 2021
SPC(P) Brandon Jenkins
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Clarification: I receive a VA disability compensation while I am also a TPU reservist, which prevents me from drawing income from both sources simultaneously. I have elected to give up drill pay in favor of my higher paying disability pay. Here is the problem: drill pay is taxable, so when Uncle Sam comes to collect, will he be taking back my gross drill pay, or my net drill pay?
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Responses: 5
LTC Program Manager
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You are not doing this right. You should collect drill pay and inform the VA of how many drill periods you do a year. They will back out your disability pay for only those days!
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CPT Lawrence Cable
CPT Lawrence Cable
>1 y
SPC(P) Brandon Jenkins The point is that unless you are a very unusual case, it to your financial advantage to take drill and at pay even though it is taxed. You only miss VA pay for the days you drill and you drill pay should be more after taxes. You can give the VA your schedule and have them deduct the days you drill, but if not, it is deducted from the next year's benefits. You need to look at you Percentage of disability verses your after tax drill pay. Unless you are over 50 %, drill pay should always be more.
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CPT Lawrence Cable
CPT Lawrence Cable
>1 y
SPC(P) Brandon Jenkins The point is that unless you are a very unusual case, it to your financial advantage to take drill and at pay even though it is taxed. You only miss VA pay for the days you drill and you drill pay should be more after taxes. You can give the VA your schedule and have them deduct the days you drill, but if not, it is deducted from the next year's benefits. You need to look at you Percentage of disability verses your after tax drill pay. Unless you are over 50 %, drill pay should always be more.
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SPC(P) Brandon Jenkins
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LTC Program Manager
LTC (Join to see)
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SPC(P) Brandon Jenkins
Even if you are making $2K a month (this is near 100% VA) thats only $66 dollars a day. That's what the VA will deduct from your disability for each MUTA or day of orders.
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MAJ Ken Landgren
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They won't tax you on income you don't receive.
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SPC(P) Brandon Jenkins
SPC(P) Brandon Jenkins
>1 y
Alright. This is some good info. I was under the impression that the Fed Govnt recouped whatever initially left its account.
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CPT Lawrence Cable
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Why would your drill pay be less than your VA payment, you shouldn't be able to enlist with 100 percent disability? It is normally to your advantage to take the Drill Pay and forgo the VA payment for the days you drill. If you do nothing, the VA will just deduct the overpayments for those days from you first couple of months payment until the overpayment is met.
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CPT Lawrence Cable
CPT Lawrence Cable
>1 y
LTC (Join to see) - Are you still considered to be deployable, Sir? All the Guard units I have been in required that for membership. That may be different on the Reserve side, never served with a TPU.
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LTC Program Manager
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CPT Lawrence Cable
Yes, there is virtually no connection between VA disability and readiness.
I have a permanent profile but no impact on pt or deployment.
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SFC Platoon Sergeant
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I was a medical readiness NCO for a decade. I always heard rumors and conjecture about x amount of disability= discharge. After extensive research we could find no such correlation. Upon apply critical thinking, there are numerous disabilities that result in a rating that are otherwise retainable/ deployable that do not produce a P3 profile IAW chap 3AR 40-501. I have had numerous SMs deploy to combat theaters with 100% DVA. E.G. females with hysterectomy=50% but fully deployable
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CPT Lawrence Cable
CPT Lawrence Cable
>1 y
SFC (Join to see) - I would be somewhat curious to know when some of this changed. My stint as S1 is out of date by about 20 years now and ended during the drawdown during the Clinton Administration. I'll leave that for a day when I am really bored.
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