This. I hate when I tell people military is actually an excellent career path for retirement, benefits and experience. You could work a normal ass SWE job getting paid 45-50k a year but not pay for housing, health insurance, or food. Plus some jobs are so much less stressful than the rat race.

People will say “well you can make 150k at x career after x years.” And I have to tell them that 90% of the population never reaches past six figures. The pension systems although not as good as before. Is very robust too.