What are people thinking? It's obvious that the people who make these decisions do not live here....and if they do, the COLA means nothing to them, because they make so much money already.

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CH-47 SI

They must find it difficult...

Those who have taken authority as the truth, rather than truth as the authority. --Gerald Massey

I bet that General gets promoted for having this review of the COLA in Korea.

Gen. X saved the DOD XDollars by reviewing the cola and lowering benefits.

What do people think about this on the boards? Is the reduction in COLA really overdue? Is the price of things in the ROK going down?

At that point he does not care what is said as long as it is good.

As for things going down in the ROK, no. The point is that from GEN Bell down, says get out and see Korea. Well, to do that you must convert $ to won to do anything outside the local area of your post.

With the $ being so low to convert to WON it is really not worth it to go anywhere until the $ gains strength. If I go to a local store a buy something with $, that $ is worth 90 cents per dollar.

I just dont understand

__________________
CH-47 SI

They must find it difficult...

Those who have taken authority as the truth, rather than truth as the authority. --Gerald Massey

I found it disappointing that in the latest Bell Sends, it talks about doing a spending survey in 2004,05, and 06. They say they didn't need to do one in 2007 because of the good quality of replies that they got in those years.

Sad, because those previous years information is probably now irrelevant. When I was here in 2004, the exchange rate was much better than it is now. The difference in rates completely changes the shopping I do.

Anyone who spends any time here knows that prices are increasing.

When my hubby got here, he would get 1200 won for a dollar.
Prices are going up, not down. Why they used surveys from 04-06 is beyond my power of understanding. Did they say it has something to do with inflation too? Cause I read about that too...
Well, what do you know, by November, DH's COLA will go down 100 dollars..that's more than a week worth of groceries...ugh

General Bell wrote an article in last week's Morning Calm Paper about it.
He explained that, even though our costs went up, the cola is based on the difference between us and the U.S. U.S. costs increased MORE than ours, so we got a reduction. It appears that would have happened even if there had been a new survey. They are reducing it 1/2 Oct 1 and 1/2 Nov 1, so it won't shock us so much. Isn't that special?

Well, at least they are doing it in time..but still...I feel special

Eh, who cares? I much prefer 7-UP anyway.

(Sorry, sometimes I just can't resist a chance to be a smart ass!)

LMAO Ginger, that made me roll

Funny,

You just wont beable to buy as much with $200 extra out of your pocket each month...

__________________
CH-47 SI

They must find it difficult...

Those who have taken authority as the truth, rather than truth as the authority. --Gerald Massey