30k a year for the same ret. plan! I know that one is BS. My dad has been saving just a couple thousand a year since he was 35. He's taken some hits in the stock market but he still has around 400 thousand in his 401k at age 60 besides his pension and other savings. If he would have saved 30k a year he would have millions by now. I was in the nav for years on fast boats late 80s early 90s as ELT. They were always trying to tout that "your navy benefits are worth over 100k a year". There are some good ones, but 100k, what a crock. Maybe if you used every single thing they offer 7 days a week, 24 hours a day. Those people (recruiters) have an agenda and you are the prize. Stop listening to them. Should you count all your time at sea as 24 hours a day and calculate a payrate per hour based on that? If you worked that much OT in the real world you would make way more than 88k a year. I suggest, since this is a HUGE decision, that you write down a list of negatives and positives. pos/neg for Navy and pos/neg for getting out. BE HONEST with yourself and assign each with a score of importance from 1 to 5. For instance, spending much more time with sons maybe a 5, but spending more time with wife might be a -2. Who knows. But be honest! Don't BS yourself. You can make over 100k a year in the commercial world as an AO, RO or SRO within 3 years at some plants, and if you are disciplined you can put 5k a year away easy, but if you can't handle doing that and you know it, then stay in the Navy. Now is the time to get serious and honest. Be sure to take into consideration the rising cost of health care also, especially if your family or you have any health problems. Rate the health care you've received in the Navy and compare it to what you will get on the outside. My buddy ET1 Paul who is retired with 21 years is actaully paying the navy for some of his family's health benifits, which I thought was strange, so watch out for that. There are pos and neg for getting out and staying in, now is the time to make an informed decision.