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That would be hard to turn down.

My friend and previous boss has been there for 2 years and is one of the heads of the KBR EMS services. He's making more than $80K / year. I was offered a position under him but, turned it down after my wife threatened to divorce me.

It's bad over there. Don't kid yourself. Even our military bases over there get morter rounds shot at them on a regular basis. The only thing that helps is that they are shooting at such an extreme range, they rarely hit.

From all accounts, travelling is the most dangerous part for us foreigners. The convoys are attacked frequently. KBR does their best to protect its workers while travelling by using armored vehicles but, that simply decreases your chances of being killed. You are still going to be injured when your vehicle is on top of the explosive when it's detonated.

Yes, the money is tempting but, if I were you, I'd try and negotiate for more. The tax free base was raised to $100,000 last I heard. Try for that much at least.

Good Luck on your decision!

***Sorry, my boss is in Iraq. I don't believe that Afghanistan is quite as bad but, still dangerous. All of my previous statements referred to Iraq.***

bennettoid wrote:No-- your not figureing in the overtime.

He does not HAVE to work 12 hours a day, 7 days a week. Everything over 40 hours is time and a half.

There is insufficient data in his post to arrive at that conclusion. All he said was that the job pays $80k/year but that you had to work 12/7. If the pay was hourly, they would have told him what the hourly rate was and he would have repeated it here, negating this discussion entirely.

I got an offer to go to Afghanistan about a year and a half ago. Security-wise, it's much better there than in Iraq. I considered it, but the money wasn't good enough to quit my day job and uproot my life for a year.

Thanks for all of the input so far. I coudn't get of the recruiter (by phone) today, but I dropped her an e-mail with some more questions.

I asked her about overtime because she did mention it although didn't elaborate. I cant really see how you can get much overtime when you are already working 72 hours a week. Unless she means that over 40 hours is considered overtime and that pay is in addition to the $80,000. Anyway I'll find out shortly.

I've heard rumor that a bonus is paid for completing the contract. I asked her about that.

As far as the hardship of being there I can handle that. I was a tank driver in Desert Storm way back when. We were in Khobar Towers when Sadaam was sending Scuds our way and the Patriots were blowing them out of the sky. Talk about fireworks. So yeah getting mortars launched at you wouldn't be fun, but once you're over there you just gotta deal with it and do your job.

My wife's cooking isn't far off from Army grade chow so that would be a smooth transition.

I have a son 18mo. old, not having him around would definitely be the hardest part of this whole deal. I'd miss a lot of him growing up even in just a year.

So as it stands now, I'm leaning toward not doing this. If I find out that the pay is going to be significantly higher I'll likely change my mind and suck it up for a year.

I'll post again when I decide tomorrow. Again thanks for the input people.

The tax free thing is an important part of the equation as would the fact that you're in a remote location and probably wouldn't spend much. You can't do a straight hourly conversion if you don't have to pay tax - you'd have to make way north of 100k/year in the US to bring home anywhere near $80,000 after taxes.

My only input is the story of a woman I knew of, whose husband did this exact same thing a little over a year ago. I've lost touch with them (it was contact through a mom's group I used to belong to in Chicago), so I'm not even sure if things worked out well for them or not. Their only motive was for the money. But once her husband left, she was sending out emails to the group wondering, if something bad happened to her husband while he was there, how would she explain the loss of him to her son. He wasn't going to defend his country or anything close to that - going only to make some quick money for themselves as well as for the company with whom he was employed.

Doing well as a younger man in Desert Storm as a military-supported soldier isn't quite the same as working for a private company with a wife a baby at home. Good luck to you and your family in making this decision. I suppose if this is something you really have the urge to do, just make sure that all deals are put into writing.

Cheers,
Loonette

I didnt know you had a wife and son.

Don't do it...unless you plan on coming back at least once a month. Your son is 18 months old...you are going to miss out on a LOT. Your wife will miss you (and probably resent you for not being around when she ends up seeing what being a single mom is like).

I kind of agree with the others - it's hard to walk away from a huge raise... but with an 18 month old baby I don't think I'd even consider it. Missing that much of a kid's life at any age is tough, but when they are toddlers it's much tougher in my opinion. A year abroad at 5 or 7 or 9 or whatever wouldn't be easy, but you gotta hang with the wife with an 18 month old - that's my two cents.

My son-in-law's brother was with the Rangers in Afghanistan last year. He was being offered $100,000 a year as a security guard as soon as his enlistment was up. We tried to talk him out of it, but he had the typical gung-ho nothing-can-touch me attitude. Trevor is back now, in a hospital in Seattle. We're hoping he'll be able to walk some day. Bob