Episode-2037- Listener Calls for 7-6-17
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Today on The Survival Podcast I take your calls on military to civilian transitioning, laws, chickens, business, cryptocurrency, gardening and more.
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- Transitioning from military to civilian life
- Thoughts on being fined for your own good (safety)
- Clipping wings on chickens and other fowl
- Selling a business, what to do to prepare for it
- Thoughts on the coming bitcoin user activated soft fork and tax issues with crypto
- Using comfrey tea as a foliar feed and soil drench
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- The Granddaddy’s Gun Club
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For the guy asking about retiring from the military and transitioning I would add a couple things. First, I am coming at this as someone like Jack who had one hitch as a young man (Cpl USMC MOS-2111 1989-1993) and then left the military and I am responsible for reviewing resumes and interviewing at work and we have a lot of former military resumes come in.
DO NOT USE A MILITARY RESUME FOR CIVILIAN JOBS!!! I know that people use resumes in the military these days when they are trying to get new assignments and they also go on interviews with the prospective command sometimes but this process and those resumes are not really much like what you will want to see in the civilian world based on my experience. I see people come in with a resume that might be great for trying to get an assignment within the military but it is not going to mean shit to most people in the civilian world. As Jack mentioned most civilians will have no idea what most of the things you did in the military are and unless they are direct experience in what they are hiring for they will probably not care either. I know you have all that great leadership and teamwork and other intangible experience from your time in the military but for the most part that will count for almost nothing in the civilian world. Also, get rid of the 8000 acronyms. People are not going to know what they mean anyway so they are more likely to get your resume thrown away than anything else. Remove those military unit logos too they don’t matter or mean anything to a civilian. No one in the civilian world will care that you have 2 assignments with some SOCOM unit unless what you did there was directly related to the job at hand and the logos just take up space.
The bottom line is this. You did your service time and people are thankful for that. What that entitles you to is the pay and benefits you received while in as well as any retirement and/or veterans benefits you are due and maybe a free meal at Denny’s on Veteran’s Day or something similar. Do not expect that your military service is going to get you anything beyond any of that. If you don’t have something concrete related to the job to offer an employer that is something more than the next guy and you can show that on your resume you will get no extra points for that military service.
Unless you are going directly into government service in the same field as your military occupational specialty you are making a career change and you should treat it as such. Expect to be almost starting over. You are not going to come in at the top in most cases and in a lot of cases you will come in close to the bottom and have to work your way up again. This can be frustrating for many people but having an attitude like something is owed because of your service will not generally get you anything.
As Jack said the one exception there is if a vet sees the resume they might give you some benefit of the doubt but they may not.
In general, I think this is solid advice and that, most times, prior military service is given only minor consideration in the civilian world. The one big exception to that is government contracting jobs in the DoD, DHS, or the Intelligence Community. Government contractors often have a preference for vets for various reasons, and at the very least one’s security clearance from their military service gives one an advantage there. I know while technically a civilian job it’s only one step removed from being a government employee, but it’s still an option. Not one I would personally recommend if you found your time in the military stifling and can’t stand bureaucracy (much of the headaches of working in government bleed over into that world), but it’s one of the few areas that give heavy preference to veterans so it’s worth considering if one’s other options are limited.
It also puts a more J-O-B type thing on your resume/CV.
When a guy only has Army on a resume if the hiring person doesn’t himself have military experience it can actually be a detriment, “oh he is a solider, I like soldiers, I support our troops, merica!, kill the sand jockeys and all, but I don’t really need a solider for this job, I don’t think he is qualified to pack widgets in a box”. (fill in this blank with anything from packing widgets, to driving a truck to working on a computer).
So what is important is to get something, anything in the field you are wanting to be in under your belt, say a year or two, then a lot of doors open.
In many ways it is just like college, no one gives a fuck about your degree until you have some real world experience to go with it. The beauty for 20 year vets is they can take something “entry level” paying say 36K a year because they are likely drawing in the neighborhood of say 2200 a month in retirement and don’t need health insurance. Vs. a college grad who owes tens of thousands and really doesn’t know how to do jack shit.
A 20 year military vet is going to crush it in his/her first gig if they just use the mentality they have from service, in a year or two if they don’t have a clear path up, they can add that experience to the CV and go hunting for what they really want.
Me, if at 38 I had 2400 a month coming in and no concerns on insurance, I would have started a business. Well first I would have found a dirt cheap place to live with a good piece of ground then started a business.
For those less than 5 years out, I say start building a passive income business now. Most military jobs (unless you are pulling NCO IC or CQ Guard Duty or something like that) are 8-5 gigs, and you get free internet in this day and age, I am just saying.
Another thing you should be doing is treating and getting documentation for all of your medical issues.
I am a retired Hospital Corpsman Chief. When you retire, the Disabled American Veterans will help you with your disability paperwork – seek them out (you do not have to be a member) — but documentation helps. This is not “scamming” the government, these are earned benefits. I am not suggesting that you commit fraud, just that you document illnesses and injuries that you have sustained during your time in service. That twisted knee on an obstacle course when you were 25 will turn into a “trick knee” at 40, and a knee replacement at 55 – Get it in your record!! I broke my ankle when I was 30, it now is arthritic and has 40% range of motion, I also seperated my shoulder, strained my back, and had a few other issues. Civilians are not required to carry 60 lbs of gear on 12-15 mile humps.
Disability benefits vary depending on your state and percentage of disability – in California your kids do not pay tuition at state schools, and my annual fishing license is $7.
So, document legitimate injuries and illnesses, have copies of your medical record (at least 2), and seek assistance from the Disabled American Veteran’s.
As far as the LEO writing the ticket for the floatation devices, the almost have to, because if they don’t and later there’s an accident, there’s injury or fatality, a ambulance chaser could make a case that if the leo intervened, the injury or fatality could have been prevented. That’s why it’s the safety ticket is issued when a break is given. It helps the municipalities prevent lawsuits or at least have some defense.
I get that, same shit with DUIs, guy is close you are not sure, you pull him over in his own driveway, you don’t want to take him in but if you don’t and later that night he drinks a half a fifth and goes on a joy ride…………..
So once again the state is the problem.
Something else to consider… If I use a saw without safety glasses, I’m only putting myself at risk. If I boat without a life jacket though and I end up in the water, I’m putting rescuers’ lives at risk who aren’t going to sit back and say, “Dumbass shouldn’t have gone boating without a life jacket!”
There are very few instances that I can think of where my choice to do something stupid affects would-be rescuers, but life jackets in water rescues is definitely one of them. We just had a swift water rescue here in Indiana where a river was swollen by flood waters and folks who HAD life jackets nearly drowned because of currents around a low head dam. The current tore their life jackets AND all their clothing off.
To be clear, I’m not a fan of most nanny state laws, but as a pragmatist, I can see the practical reasons for some of them. Just my $.02. 🙂
Sorry that is a bit of a stretch there!
If a person can swim, they swim and if they can’t they are dead long before anyone gets there to help them.
And this from a guy that pulled a fat assed Major out of a rip tide while my buddy pulled his fat assed wife out of that same rip tide on Veracruz beach in Panama.
JM bullion accepts Bitcoin. What do you think of buying gold and silver with Bitcoin as far as taxes go?
That is a CPA question I would think. However, by strict interpretation when you buy something you effectively sell it so you would have to pay taxes on it based on the price it was at when you made the buy vs. the price it was when you bought it.
That said if you sent it from say a wallet of your own vs. a service like coinbase, well, I am not sure how anyone would know.
Was eyeing this yesterday. 1 BTC = 2 Gold Eagles = 300 1/2 oz Sunshine Silver Rounds
So tempting. 😉
With Silver below $15.50, had to try this.
Tip: Make sure your wallet is sync’d before hitting the checkout button
15 minutes to send and it’s going to take my wallet 3 hours to download the last 3 days of blocks.
This is why I use things like Jaxx for purchases.
Yay for 18th Century Cooking on YouYube!
A few good starter videos for preppers might be:
The Perfect Campfire Coffee! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQBZZ6P3aB0
Pemmican: The Ultimate Survival Food https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_vLuMobHCI
The Top 6 Historical Egg Preservation Techniques! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yUYgguMz1qI
Thanks for giving them a shout out Jack!
YouTube channels:
TiborasaurusRex
http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqymwlCbVwpMnSLrd-NAQJQ
Former guest on the show.
His Sniper 101 series is unparalleled when it comes to the precision rifle. While geared to extreme long range, it still has piles of information that applies to normal range rifle shooting.
The videos on religion are also fascinating. They are totally non denominational and there is no preaching at all. They are purely an analysis of the meaning of the Bible from a contextual perspective as opposed to taking pieces of the text without context to direct human behavior.
EatTheWeeds
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8tw8DcGAGmo
Very good resource for wild edibles.
Another “Yay!” for 18th Century Cooking. Btw, Jas. is the old-time abbreviation for James. (Not sure why he chose this for the business as his name is Jon, but perhaps for an ancestor.)
The only trouble is that your You-tube picks so far are so good that they are completely engrossing.
Jack,
I think some of your comments on the electric fence are incorrect. A bird flying to the top of the fence will not get a shock. To get a shock from an electric fence something needs to be touching the ground and the fence to complete the circuit. There are some fences that alternate positive and ground wires, but you still have to touch two of them to complete the circuit to get a shock.
I never said a bird landing on a top wire would get shocked, I don’t know where you got that.
One more tip for folks making their transition to the civilian world. Most of us signed up for 4 years, then got it. But don’t forget that you probably really signed up for 4 year active and 4 years inactive. That’s four years of inactive RESERVE. During those four “extra” years in which you can be called, you still have lots of privileges. Go to your local base (or some recruiting offices) with a uniform and get yourself a reserve ID. When it expires, keep it. It’s easier to use it than a DD214 for proof of veteran status, etc.
Not sure why, but when I got out, the Navy didn’t offer me a reservist ID. So I called up a local office in Denver. They said just swing on by with my dress uniform top and my DD214. It took like 5 minutes.
Fast forward 20 years. I still carry that ID and use it a couple of times a month.
Wait! You can get a reserve ID on IRR? Why did I never know that!
I was on another search, and found this: http://the-military-guide.com/. Just in case he hasnt yet found this page!