The 2026 Pay Year, In Use — March 2026

Bottom line up front. By March, the 2026 pay-year changes are in your LES. The actions worth taking this month: confirm the rates landed correctly, lock in your TSP allotment for the year, and pin down your spouse's state of legal residence before you file.

The 2026 changes that hit your LES

Three things changed for active-duty service members effective 1 January 2026:

• Basic pay raise. An across-the-board raise per the FY2026 National Defense Authorization Act, with a targeted larger increase for the most junior enlisted ranks. Confirm your January LES reflects the new table — DFAS pay tables are the source of truth.
• BAH rates. Updated by ZIP code based on the prior year's housing market data. Some duty stations went up, some held, and some came down. If your station's rate dropped, individual-rate protection keeps you on the higher prior rate as long as your dependency status and duty station don't change.
• TSP contribution limits. The IRS published 2026 limits in late 2025. The age 50+ catch-up still applies, and the SECURE 2.0 enhanced catch-up for ages 60–63 is in its second year. Verify your allotment against the current TSP limits and our TSP Modeler to project growth.

A common March surprise: BAH adjustments can lag a pay cycle. If your January 1 BAH rate didn't show up until February 1, that's normal — but you may be owed a one-time retro. Pull your January and February LES side by side and confirm. If something looks off and you want it explained, ask the Military Expert with the line items pasted in.

Tax season for military spouses: three filing options

The Military Spouses Residency Relief Act (MSRRA) lets a non-military spouse choose how their income is taxed when accompanying a service member on PCS orders. As of 2026, three filing options exist:

1. Match the service member's state of legal residence. Most common. If the service member is a Texas resident (no state income tax), the spouse can claim Texas — even while working a W-2 job in California — provided eligibility rules are met.
2. Keep your own pre-marriage state of legal residence. If you had your own SLR before marriage and never abandoned it, you can keep it.
3. Adopt the duty-station state. Sometimes the cleanest path, especially when working a local job at the duty station.

The remote-employment wrinkle: if you work remotely for an employer in a third state (for example, a spouse in Norfolk working remotely for a New York employer), most states tax based on where the work is performed, not where the employer sits. Our Spouse Tax Wizard walks through which state has a real claim on which dollars and gives you a remote-employment classification with the JTR and statute citations.

What to watch this quarter

• April 15. Federal tax deadline. SCRA, combat-zone, and certain spouse extensions still apply if you qualify — confirm with the IRS military taxpayer hub before assuming.
• April–May. PCS orders typically drop for summer moves. Start planning weight tickets, household-goods (HHG) vs. personally-procured-move (PPM) decisions, and lodging now. The PCS Planner handles the per-diem math; the Base Navigator compares neighborhoods at your next station.
• End of Q1. Last good window to revise your TSP allotment if you want even spreading across the calendar year. After June, you have to backload.

New on Garrison Ledger

• The Spouse Tax Wizard (/dashboard/spouse-tax-wizard) is free for everyone, with a remote-employment classifier built in for the third-state cases above.
• Ask the Military Expert (/dashboard/ask) — five questions a month free, no card required. Citations on every answer.
• Six free calculators are now indexed in the tools hub: TSP, SDP, salary, PCS, house-hacking, and on-base savings.

Sources verified March 2026

• Basic pay tables — DFAS
• BAH rates and individual-rate protection — DTMO
• TSP contribution limits — TSP.gov
• MSRRA statute — 50 U.S.C. §4001
• Joint Travel Regulations — DTMO JTR
• Military taxpayer information — IRS.gov/military