than 2 years' service be increased up to 10 percent, and that O-1's be increased up to 10 percent Sergeant REIN. An equal pay raise. Senator CANNON. Have you made any statement as to the costs of the bill if it were to incorporate the recommendations that you have suggested to the Congress here? Sergeant REIN. No, sir, I have not. I only ask for a minimum of 10 percent. In other words, it drops from 14 down to 12.5, so make the raise a minimum of 10 percent. Senator CANNON. I understand that, but what I am trying to find out is if the committee were to accept your suggestions, can you tell us how much additional that would cost the Government, over and above the amount as set forth in the bill now? Sergeant REIN. No, sir. Senator CANNON. You also, in referring to the case of a military man who dies shortly after his retirement, where you say he can leave none of his retirement to his survivors, you are aware of the fact that he can under the contingency option plan designate so that his survivors would receive benefits just the same as civil service can do? Sergeant REIN. Yes, sir, I am aware of that. Senator CANNON. So, you didn't mean to imply that he couldn't exercise his contingency option? Sergeant REIN. No, sir, I didn't. Senator CANNON. And provide for his survivors, if he desires? Sergeant REIN. No, sir, I didn't. Senator CANNON. Thank you very much. We appreciate your appearance and giving the benefit of your views to the committee. I as sure that they will be fully considered. Sergeant REIN. Thank you very much, sir. Senator CANNON. The next witness will be Dr. Leroy Burney, representing the Commissioned Officers Association of the U.S. Public Health Service. Dr. Burney, we are very happy to have you here this morning. STATEMENT OF DR. LEROY BURNEY, ON BEHALF OF THE COMMISSIONED OFFICERS ASSOCIATION OF THE U.S. PUBLIC HEALTH SERVICE Dr. BURNEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My name is Dr. Burney and I retired from the U.S. Public Health Service after 30 years of service in 1961. My service began as an intern in 1930 and was concluded in February 1961 after 42 years as Surgeon General as a terminal assign ment. My present position, Mr. Chairman, is vice president of health sciences at Temple University, which includes medicine, dentistry, pharmacy, nursing, and the teaching hospital. I do want to express my sincere thanks and appreciation for an opportunity to present the views of the Commissioned Officers Association of the U.S. Public Health Service on H.R. 5555. The Commissioned Officers Association of the U.S. Public Health Service represents approximately 3,300 members, which number includes almost 75 percent of the career active duty personnel of that Service. These members are physicians, dentists, scientists, engineers, pharmacists, nurses, veterinarians, dietitians, and others in the Commissioned Corps of the Public Health Service. The corps is unique in that its entire personnel is derived exclusively from professions in which they are trained outside the Service and qualified prior to commissioning. The Commissioned Officers Association is seriously concerned with the pay rates contained in H.R. 5555. The association concurs with the general purpose of the bill, to increase the rates of the basic pay for members of the uniformed services. However, in certain areas the present proposal does not meet the current needs of the Public Health Service and will jeopardize many of its operating programs. Two of the three points that I will make, Mr. Chairman, have already been enunciated quite well by General Foss, but my remarks are quite brief and I would like to emphasize those. The Public Health Service cannot retain many of its key people because they can no longer compete with the salaries and fringe benefits offered by universities, nonprofit research organizations and civil service itself. As a graphic demonstration of this disparity NIH of the Public Health Service asked the Director grade research personnel to furnish information about offers of employment which they had received from outside of the Government during the past 2 years. The replies show that 80 percent of the corps members in the senior staff at NIH have recently received offers for better paying positions outside the Federal Government. This study indicates that each officer in the group received an average of almost three offers in the last 2 years. We will undoubtedly lose many of these highly trained officers at the peak of their productivity. Mr. Chairman, if the Public Health Service is to retain its position in the front ranks of intramural research, in the biomedical and environmental health fields, and in all its other responsibilities, it must regain its ability to bid, on a comparable basis, for the talent to perform its mission. The need is now. At the present time, there is also a great disparity between the pay system of civil service personnel and that of the uniformed services. This gap will be further widened if the recent recommendations of the President concerning further civil service pay raises are implemented. Comparability studies show that in 1958 the maximum statutory pay and allowances of a colonel, navy captain or director in the commissioned corps of the Public Health Service was only $654 less than a GS-15; in 1964, it will be $3,285 less. Mr. Chairman, most of the Public Health Service Division Chiefs and Institute Directors fall into this category. There are numerous instances where a commissioned officer of Public Health Service in a highly responsible position of leadership is paid considerably less than his subordinates. at least one instance this inequity is so advanced that the salary of one director-grade officer is exceeded by 30 of his subordinates representing 14 percent of his professional and scientific staff. In Mr. Chairman, our Nation's health problems and needs have greatly accelerated within the past several years. The Public Health Service, as the principal Federal health agency, has a specific obligation to anticipate and to play its proper role in meeting the health needs of the American people. The Commissioned Officers Association does not believe that the present pay bill provides adequate pay rates to accomplish this objective and recommends a higher proportionate increase in the base pay for the O-5 and O-6 pay grades. Further, the association recommends that this committee and the Congress consider additional pay for scientific, engineering, and other highly trained professional categories in short supply. This will greatly assist the Public Health Service in recruiting and retaining better qualified scientific personnel for longer periods of service. It is suggested that the committee may construct some provisions authorizing the Secretary of the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, on recommendation of the Surgeon General, to establish additional pay up to $250 a month, similar in principle to provisions already established in other Federal personnel systems, to provide for these groups. This provision would allow for elimination of discrepancies in pay among officers of allied professions operating at the same echelon. The Randall Committee report took cognizance of the importance of the Public Health Service situation and listed as one of the further problems deserving consideration— the need for special provisions in the military pay system applicable to the compensation of professional personnel in the Commissioned Corps of the U.S. Public Health Service. Mr. Chairman, the 1962 Civil Service Pay Act included a section calling for a mandatory Presidential review of civilian pay every year in an effort to affect comparability between civil service salaries and those paid in private industry. The Commissioned Officers Association recommends that the uniformed services pay bill include a similar provision. Specifically, this provision would require the President to direct a yearly study comparing the rates of salary for members of the uniformed services with the rates of salary paid for the same levels of work in the civil service and private enterprise. The President would then be required to report the comparison to Congress together with any recommended salary changes he deems advisable. We believe that such a provision would assure a continued study of uniformed services pay and would represent a genuine effort to affect realistic comparability levels between the civil service pay system and that of the uniformed services. Mr. Chairman, that concludes my prepared statement. I wish to thank you and the members of this subcommittee for the opportunity to present testimony on behalf of the Commissioned Officers Association of the U.S. Public Health Service. Senator CANNON. Thank you, Dr. Burney, for your appearance and for presenting a very fine statement. You indicate that your association has taken the position that the bill does not provide adequate pay rates, particularly in the base pay for the O-5 and 0-6 grades. Since the bill was reported over from the House you are aware of the fact that the Department of Defense has recommended a $30 flat increase in addition to the amounts in the bill for the first lieutenants, captains, major and lieutenant colonels? Dr. BURNEY. Yes, sir. Senator CANNON. Do you think that that would meet your suggestion here in respect to the O-5 rate? Dr. BURNEY. To some extent, Mr. Chairman, yes. I would also like to emphasize-I think I can speak from my 30 years of experience with all of the services that we are concerned not only with recruiting and retaining the young officers, but after 15 or 20 years the Government has a considerable investment in these individuals, and I think we have an obligation here hopefully to the Government to do everything possible to retain these experienced individuals who are in these two grades so that they will not retire for some other provisions. It has been my experience in our own service that this is a critical group, and one in which we are seriously lacking in order to meet some of the additional obligations which are placed upon us by Congress each year. Senator CANNON. What I am trying to find out though is whether you are recommending an increase over and above in the O-5 category, for example, the $30 which the DOD has already recommended be added to the bill? Dr. BURNEY. Our recommendation, Mr. Chairman, would be an additional amount to this, and then including the O-6 category with it. Senator CANNON. What is the amount? What amount would you recommend? Dr. BURNEY. May I submit this for the record? Our association has a suggestion on this and if I may have the privilege of submitting our recommendation. Senator CANNON. All right, sir, if you will submit that for the record. You have made no recommendation for an increase of the grades below O-5. You feel then that with the amounts as recommended to be added by the DOD that those are adequate? Dr. BURNEY. Our association believes that will remedy the situation, for the present at least. (The following information was subsequently submitted:) Senator HoWARD W. CANNON, COMMISSIONED OFFICERS ASSOCIATION Chairman, Senate Armed Services Subcommittee, DEAR SENATOR CANNON: The Commissioned Officers Association appreciates the request made of Dr. Leroy Burney and the opportunity to submit its recommendations on base pay for the 0-5 and 0-6 pay grades and additional incentive pay for physicians and dentists at the 6- and 10-year level. Enclosed are the separate recommendations as requested. If the subcommittee desires any further information or specific details as to how the enclosed figures were arrived at, the Commissioned Officers Association will be pleased to furnish such information. May I take this opportunity to extend our thanks and appreciation for the kind courtesy afforded by you and your subcommittee to our witness, Dr. Leroy Burney. Sincerely, WILLIAM J. LUCCA, Jr., Commissioned Officers Association of the U.S. Public Health Service recommendations on base pay for 0-5 and 0-6 pay grades N.B. It should be noted that the above figures are based entirely on comparability between GS-14 and GS-15 and 05 and 06 pay grades, respectively. In arriving at these figures base pay, quarters allowance, and the subsistence allowance figures in H.R. 5555 were used. These figures graphically illustrate the inordinate disparity that exists between the 05 and 06 pay grades and that of their comparable civil service pay grades (GS-14 and GS-15). The steady deterioration in the comparability concept since 1958, evidenced by the fact that civil service has received three pay increases since that time, has contributed greatly to this disparity. The Commissioned Offiers Association of the U.S. Public Health Service realizes that budgetary considerations must be taken into account in providing for pay increases for our uniformed services. These budgetary considerations apparently were of small consequence in providing past civil service pay raises. Nevertheless, the association respectfully recommends, if the increases suggested by COA are not feasible in one fiscal year, that such increases be provided in two or three increments similar to the provisions in the 1962 Civil Service Pay Act. Senator CANNON. You have also suggested that the committee and the Congress consider additional pay for scientific, engineering and other highly trained professional categories in short supply. When Secretary Paul was here I asked him about the proposal concerning additional pay for the doctors in the doctors and dentists category, and he indicated that the Department would support a change or a raise in that pay for those specialized areas if Congress saw fit to come up with such a proposal. Dr. BURNEY. Yes, sir. Senator CANNON. You have included other areas here though that while they create a problem to you, they certainly would also create a problem to Congress if we were to open the doors up to recommend additional specialized pay areas. You are familiar, of course, with the problems there, I am sure. Dr. BURNEY. I can well understand that this is not a simple matter. On the other hand, I believe all the services are using engineers and scientists, both of which are in extremely short categories and undoubtedly will become increasingly short in the years to come. This makes it extremely difficult I know from my own experience in the recruitment and in the retention of engineers and in scientists. For example, we had at least when I was Surgeon General, one or two directors of our Institute at the National Institutes of Health who were scientists and did not receive the scientific pay therefor that |