This is just as bad, if not worse, in other career fields too. I am an active duty EE. The Air Force paid for my undergrad then paid for my Masters. I am on my

This is just as bad, if not worse, in other career fields too. I am an active duty EE. The Air Force paid for my undergrad then paid for my Masters. I am on my payback tour in a research lab, and I spend more then 80% of my time managing contractual requirements, finances, and other "inherently government functions" that they need a warm body to do (and that I have only gotten on the job training for). This is not even close to the unique story. Active Duty get tapped for all of the "odds and ends" duties because they can be tasked to, they either won't hire someone or taking the time to hire someone takes too much time/resources. I had a friend of mine (also with a fully paid Undergrad and Grad in engineering) with the same experience get tapped to do Honor Guard Duty for six months. Seriously.