That's not what a military discount is or does. It's for active duty only, or full time retired, meaning you need an active and valid military ID on your person that matches YOU. Not your wife, not your friend Larry, not your brother Darrell, not your OTHER brother Darrell, YOU. It's one of the things that makes life harder for people who leave the military. And while your in it, it does you little good.

I know this because I've managed stores with military discounts. The only thing worse than having to say ''we don't do that'' is ''Yes we do'' Because the reality is that unless your talking to an old guy in a military insignia cap, or a surprisingly young enlisted person in uniform or military sweats, they aren't getting the ID. You got your shins blown off in Vietnam? Well fuck you, the discount is for active enlisted and CAREER officers. No one the fuck else. Guess how many dessert storm, Vietnam, Iraq, Korean War, or WWII vets like hearing that shit explained to them. They are LIVID. They want ass pats and bjs they don't want to hear they can't save $0.07 on a pile of lumber because they didn't make being drafted a career just got PTSD and forever shrapnel. I LOVE telling people no discount for anyone. It's fantastic.

There are two ways to look at it, as I understand:

1. Many (certainly not all) vets have a chip on their shoulder and expect white glove treatment. Kind of like a less whiny Karen.

2. Many are of the belief that we should not reward people for aiding the government in its atrocities.

I think the meme is an exaggeration of those positions.

why not doctors and nurses too? Why stop there and why not include firefighters, government workers or teachers?

Some places do this.

Who compensates you

In a round about way - everyone else. Though it's possible you just make less profit 5% of the time.

America fetishize military service.

It sounds pretty stupid.

America in a nutshell

If your store happens to be close to an army base, do you just accept the disadvantage of giving away part of your profit?

No they just raise the base price for everyone.

Many Americans have an uncanny reverence for the military and those who served. I guess that reverence seeped its way into many a retail store’s management.

I think it’s just about optics for the most part.

I could be wrong here... but around the George W. Bush administration + 9/11 and the government painting everything they do as something to protect "against the terrorists!!!!" that's when a lot of things started happening.

That's when the view of the military seemed to flip and it's just been stuck that way. Movies like Top Gun were made as a PR stunt to make the military look better. The same is for basically every cop show out there: make cops look like the good guys. Anywho, every company went out of their way to really show "how much they support the troops" by giving a discount. And every smooth-brain started saying "THANK YOU FOR YOUR SERVICE" every single time. The hero worship was/is real, and it shouldn't be, and it's a real problem. (Totally different conversation, but it's led to an influx of people joining the military, or trying to, who really shouldn't). Before Bush + 9/11, I don't recall military discounts outside of, like, businesses that were owned/operated by vets.

It's plain old jingoism. Just point and laugh at it.

Actually that is not that insane. Canadian military often gets to take advantage to discounts in America.

Who respected him more?

But really you’re just punishing veterans with PTSD

Failing to give special treatment to someone is not punishing them. Especially when we're talking about special treatment for an entire category of people, most of whom don't have PTSD (estimates range from 6-27% of those deployed to a war zone, and not all veterans served in a war zone), many of whom are financially well off.

Maybe the VA and the federal government should do more for vets. Maybe the military itself should take care of the troops a bit better. But asking private businesses to prop up veterans at their own expense seems like a misguided approach.

None of this entitles them to a discount.

Ah but you brought freedom and democracy to a bunch of dumb dusty people, right?