this post was submitted on 11 Sep 2024
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Yes rates are used most of the time in forms of address. However you do have a rank, for example E-5 or Petty Officer Second Class. However when addressing enlisted you'd usually say something like CTM2, IT2 etc... Until you hit chief then you are just called Chief, or senior if you are a Senior Chief, Master Chief doesn't get abbreviated to Master for obvious reasons, and MCPON is usually referred to as "mic pon" phonetically for Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy.
E-5 is a pay grade. PO2 is a rate.
Colloquially, you could call PO2 a rank, but strictly speaking it's a rate, because the Navy has a lot of jargon for historical reasons.
Enlisted dont have rank in the navy, just rates. Check the article I posted.
They have pay grades, rank and rates in the Navy, though there are actually also unrated enlisted that get all assigned all the crappiest jobs until they get assigned a rate.
Enlisted only have rates, not ranks. It's a weird navy thing. Enlisted also have "ratings" which is your job, I.e aviation tech, boatswan, etc.
Youre also talking about firemen/seamen/constructionmen/etc. These roles are e-1 to e-3 and have a rate, but not a rating.
In my experience, no one knows the rank/rate distinction and everyone just refers to rank. It's not something they explain well.
OK, let me just break this down for you. Rates are a job in the Navy. For example, in that wikipedia article, a Fireman recruit is a rate -- their job. Their rank would be a Seaman Recruit. Their paygrade would be an E-1.
In your example, a Constructionman would be an E-3. Constructionman would be their rate. Their rank would be Seaman.
You can see this better at https://www.defense.gov/Resources/Insignia/
They don't list rates, because there's many, many, many different jobs in the different branches. The Navy is odd in that they usually refer to each other by rates, not ranks. In every other branch, people usually refer to each other by rank and not their MOS/AFSC/Whatever. It would be weird in the USAF for example to refer to some Airman First Class as 2A33C or whatever.
You can see this further explained at https://www.military.com/navy/enlisted-rates.html where they list the rates and talk about them but then they list the ranks and talk about them. They are tied together by paygrade.
And once again, in the US Navy, an enlisted person can literally not have a rate and be called Unrated until they are assigned a rate. Usually this happens to very junior enlisted.
Youre mistaken. A "rate" is where you are on the E1 - E9 paygrade scale. A "rating" is your assigned job, what you get after A school. A Fireman has a rate of E-1/3. He does not have a rating because he hasn't been to A school. You can also "strike" for a rating by testing into it, but thats rarer.
There is more history about this confusing system here Note that this is from a .mil site specifically about Navy history. The article is from 2019.
I don't want to keep replying to this but in response to your 'this is from a .mil site specifically ...' I linked to the DOD's actual gov website.
This article is relevant for NAVPERS 18068F because the Navy has all of this annoying traditions, like referring to '-' as Tack like they are pretending to be a flagman from 1835 on a ship and refer to a snackbar as a gedunk and blah blah blah.
But they still have a military rank. Sure, if you ask someone enlisted person what their 'rate' is they are going to respond with "PO1" if they are a Petty Officer First Class but if you have a CAC ID, under RANK it is going to say PO1 with the USN's seal in the top-right. Because it is their military rank. The USN can call it a rate as well and traditionally it can be known as a rate in the USN but it is still a military rank. It will even say that on your ID card if you have one or have had one. As I recall, this is also true for the old green ID cards.
It's not a tradition, it's the correct nomenclature. The article I posted isn't talking about history, it's talking about how rate/rank works in the Navy.
Your link has to do with ratings, I.e. jobs. That is a distinct thing from rate, i.e paygrade. It refers to enlisted by ratings and paygrade, never rank.
As to military ID, they use a generic format that has "rank" and "grade" listed. This format is used for all US armed forces, enlisted and officers, and as such is a generic catch all since all other branches of the military use rank for enlisted. For uniformity sake, the card omits the Navy's odd quirk.