The US Naval Institute News Service reports on how the Coast Guard is attempting to remedy its personnel shortage.
Recruiting had never been an issue for the Coast Guard, Vice Adm. Paul Thomas, deputy commandant for mission support, said at separate Sea Air Space panel. People would come to the service, and they met the necessary numbers with little effort. Now, the service has to revamp its approach.
The Commandant has asked people to think outside the box and it looks like we are beginning to see results. We can’t expect that every new idea will work, but at least the Coast Guard is trying new ideas.
Chuck Hill's CG Blog 
This from a Navy League post, “On the pay issue, Wittman said, “this 5.2% increase this year was great, but remember, the lower you are on the salary scale, the percentage is not as quite as much in your paycheck. Take for example, if you come into our services, if you are a private in the Army, the Marine Corps, third-class Seamen, third-class Airman, your starting salary is $23,000 a year. That’s 11 dollars and 50 cents an hour asking you to do the most dangerous work of the nation, putting your life on the line. And guess what? You go to Chick-fil-A and serve chicken sandwiches and make more money in a much, much less challenging or dangerous environment. We have got to fix the junior enlisted salary differential.” HASC Members Prepare to Dive into Navy Budget – Seapower (seapowermagazine.org)
Fix the woke and that rediculouse blended retirement system and you jusy may be able to recruit people.
Retention is good, so don’t think Woke is the problem. Extremely low unemployment always makes recruiting more difficult.
Too many potential recruits don’t even know the Coast Guard exists.
Chuck
When I joined the Coast Guard in 1975, there was at least 3 to 4 recruiting offices in the Bay area. Today I check and I could only find one in Alameda.
When we were having no trouble getting recruits, we cut the number of recruiters. The CG has started increasing the number of recruiters but I think part of the problem is that the number of billets has increased. we have 56 FRCs (24 billets each) replacing 41 WPB110s (16 billets). 1344 billets vs 656 but really some of the 110s are still in commission and we are going to