Military Officer Quality in the All-Volunteer Force / Matthew F. Cancian, Michael W. Klein.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Cancian, Matthew F.

Contributor:

National Bureau of Economic Research.

Klein, Michael W.

Series:

Working Paper Series (National Bureau of Economic Research) no. w21372.

NBER working paper series no. w21372

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource: illustrations (black and white);

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Mass. National Bureau of Economic Research 2015.

Summary:

We show a statistically significant and quantitatively meaningful decline in the intelligence of Marine Officers from 1980 to 2014 as measured by their scores on the General Classification Test (GCT) which has been shown to be a good predictor of success in the military. This contrasts with the increasing quality of enlisted personnel since 1973 when conscription ended. We argue that the source of this decline is the greater number of young Americans in college since Marine officers must have a four-year degree. The increasing diversity of the pool of incoming officers has not contributed to the decline in GCT scores.

Notes:

Print version record

July 2015.