Here’s How Much It Would Cost the Military to Provide Transition Care to Transgender Troops

Here’s How Much It Would Cost the Military to Provide Transition Care to Transgender Troops

Ashton Carter, U.S. President Barack Obama's nominee to be secretary of defense, testifies before a Senate Armed Services Committee confirmation hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, February 4, 2015.  REUTERS/Gary Cameron
© Gary Cameron / Reuters
By Millie Dent

As the U.S. military studies the implications of lifting a ban on transgender people serving in the armed forces, a new study says that the cost of providing transition-related health care to those service members would be about $5.6 million a year, or “little more than a rounding error in the military's $47.8 billion annual health care budget.”

After U.S. Defense Secretary Ashton Carter announced in mid-July that that Department of Defense would look into lifting the ban, opponents expressed concern about the potential high costs of providing care to transgender individuals. In last week’s debate among Republican presidential candidates, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee said he wasn’t sure “how paying for transgender surgery for soldiers, sailors, airmen, Marines makes our country safer.” 

Related: The Surprising Way the Military Could Save Millions

The new study published in The New England Journal of Medicine estimated that 12,800 transgender troops currently serve and are eligible for health care in the U.S., but only 188 transgender service members would require transition-related care annually. Aaron Belkin, the San Francisco State University researcher who conducted the survey, checked for accuracy using data from the Australian military, which already covers transition-related care, and compared costs with insurance plans offered to University of California employees and their dependents. 

Belkin emphasized that costs could be lower than expected for several reasons. Among those, transition-related care would mitigate other serious and potentially costly conditions, such as suicidal thoughts, and might improve job performance. 

Acknowledging that the costs might be higher than he estimates, Belkin still says they would be too low to matter and shouldn’t be a factor in deciding whether the ban is lifted or not.

In June, the American Medical Association said there is “no medically valid reason” to prohibit transgender individuals from serving in the military.

Top Reads From The Fiscal Times

Comcast to Cut the Cord with Time Warner

A Comcast sign is shown on the side of a vehicle in San Francisco, California February 13, 2014. REUTERS/Robert Galbraith
© Robert Galbraith / Reuters
By Alexander Rader

Comcast is dropping its merger with Time Warner after a year of regulatory pushback, according to Bloomberg. The news wire's unnamed sources say there will be an announcement tomorrow.

In today's changing media landscape it is not really clear what the preemptive breakup of a media megacorp (formed from mere media titans) will mean for consumers, especially in the face of Verizon's push to slim down its bundled offerings, the new ala carte service from HBO and the continued expansion of Netflix's original programming. As more and more people cut the cord, the market for traditional cable TV is eroding, and more consumers opt simply for an Internet connection.

Even without that, Comcast dropping its deal probably will have no impact at all for the average cable subscriber, given the already segregated monopolies allowed individual cable companies. So, unless you own stock in either of these companies, this is pretty much just more status quo in a rapidly changing market.

Can Low Self-Control Turn You Into Edward Snowden?

REUTERS/Bobby Yip
By Jacqueline Leo

Be very wary if your employer asks you to take a test and then says please put on this cap. The cap could have sensors measuring your “self-control,” which researchers at Iowa State University have connected to—cybersecurity.

Yup—this wasn’t about eating the last cookie, having sex with a stranger, or taking a hit from some unknown new drug just because your friend said it was an amazing experience. The test measures how long someone hesitates before doing something risky or wrong.

Hmm.  Maybe I’ll wait a few seconds before robbing that jewelry store! If they waited, the researchers determined that the employees were considering the consequences of their actions and therefore had higher self-control than those who simply filled their duffle bag with whatever bling was in sight. 

Those with higher self-control were deemed better cyber security risks than the low self-control group.

But who knows?  Maybe the high group was just casing the joint and calculating how much they could carry without getting caught. Or maybe they were searching for the largest unflawed diamond in the case that could be hidden in their pocket!

So much for brainwaves.

These Students Are Making Even More Than They Expect After Graduation

By Beth Braverman

College students who major in STEM fields generally know that they can make more money than their peers once they graduate, but they don’t know how much more.

Turns out, those students majoring in science, technology, engineering and math, actually have starting salaries that are higher than expected, according to a new report by the National Association of Colleges and Employers.

Engineering majors, for example, expect to earn $56,000, but actually receive 15.5 percent more than that, with starting salaries average nearly $65,000. Computer Science majors expect to make around $51,000, but receive 22 percent for an average starting salary of $62,000.

Chemistry majors have the largest gap between expectations and reality: They expect to earn an average of $39,000 but take home an average $58,000 in their first year, a 51 percent increase.

Related: The Closing of the Millennial Mind on Campus

The typical college graduate in 2014 received a starting salary of $48,000. Liberal arts and humanities majors had the lowest starting salary, with an average of just $39,000, according to NACE.

Not only do STEM majors enjoy higher salaries, but they can also expect more job security and better job prospects. All of the top 25 jobs recently compiled by U.S. News and World Report fell into either a science- or math-based discipline.

Still, not everyone has the interest or aptitude to excel in a STEM career. A third of those who begin their college career majoring in those fields end up transferring to a difference study area, according to a recent report by RTI International.

Will Obama Send a Smoke Signal About Weed?

Illinois Senate approves marijuana for medical uses
Reuters
By Ciro Scotti

The resignation of Michele M. Leonhart, chief of the Drug Enforcement Administration, just one day after 4/20 -- which is sort of Thanksgiving for stoners -- offers President Obama an opportunity to replace her with someone who shares his relatively benign view of marijuana.

The right appointment might also be a gift to Hillary Rodham Clinton since it would signal to younger voters that it's not just libertarian-leaning Republicans like Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky who want to decriminalize the use of pot.

Representative Early Blumenauer, an Oregon Democrat, told The New York Times that Obama should appoint someone who "understands the federal approach to marijuana isn't working."

Related: How to Stop Cyber Attacks: Let Workers Smoke Pot

The flashpoint that led to the departure of Leonhart after a 35-year career at the D.E.A. was a congressional hearing that revealed agency agents in Colombia had taken part in parties with prostitutes paid by drug cartels. But Leonhart, who has lumped marijuana in with crack, meth and heroin, found herself at odds with the President, who has called pot no more dangerous than alcohol.

“Hopefully this is a sign that the Reefer Madness era is coming to an end at the D.E.A.,” Mason Tvert, the director on communications at the Marijuana Policy Project, told Bloomberg Politics.

How to Stop Cyber Attacks: Let Workers Smoke Pot

An Initiative To Legalize Marijuana In California To Appear On Nov. Ballot
Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
By Jackie Leo

What’s true for the government is true for business. FBI Director James Comey thinks you can’t hire top tech talent with a ban on weed. It all started in the Reagan administration, which imposed a no-hire policy for applicants who toked up within the past three years. Good luck with that.

In 2014, Comey raised the issue during a speech: “A lot of the nation’s top computer programmers and hacking gurus are also fond of marijuana. I have to hire a great workforce to compete with those cyber criminals and some of those kids want to smoke weed on the way to the interview.”

That’s not the only reason the government can’t hire competent programmers and white hat hackers.  They come at a high price, there’s a shortage, and they hate red tape and bureaucratic annoyances.  For some lawmakers, though, it’s easier to get lost in the weed than try to reform the federal hiring process.  That’s why Gerry Connolly (D-VA) and Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) have two proposals in the House requiring info from the intelligence director on how classifying pot as Schedule 1 narcotic crimps the feds recruiting efforts.