The Effect of Service-Length Obligations on Occupational Selection: Evidence from West Point Graduates

This paper estimates the effect of the U.S. Army's June 2020 decision to increase the service obligation for Army aviators from six to ten years on West Point cadets' preferences for aviation. We use a difference-in-differences identification strategy, exploiting how the policy took effect...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inDefence and peace economics Vol. 35; no. 1; pp. 109 - 127
Main Authors Redman, Samuel, Greenberg, Kyle
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Switzerland Routledge 02.01.2024
Taylor & Francis LLC
Subjects
Aircraft pilots
Aviation
Cadets
Labor contract length
military labor
military service opportunity cost
nonwage amenities
Obligations
occupational selection
Popularity
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Summary:This paper estimates the effect of the U.S. Army's June 2020 decision to increase the service obligation for Army aviators from six to ten years on West Point cadets' preferences for aviation. We use a difference-in-differences identification strategy, exploiting how the policy took effect after the Class of 2021 submitted four sets of interim preferences but before cadets submitted two final sets of preferences, using preferences from cadets in the Classes of 2015 to 2020 to form counterfactual outcomes. The increased service obligation made aviation less popular, reducing the percentage of cadets who ranked aviation as their first choice by 4.1 percentage points (baseline of 18.5%) and increasing the percentage of cadets who ranked aviation as among their three lowest choices by 6.9 percentage points (baseline of 8.9%). The reduction in aviation's popularity is most pronounced among cadets with above-median grade-point-averages, above-median aviation talent scores, and above-median SAT scores.
ISSN:1024-2694
1476-8267
DOI:10.1080/10242694.2022.2101199