Military recruitment is robustly correlated with the economy – declining unemployment devastates enlistment
Warner ’12 [John T. Warner; Professor Emeritus of Economics, Clemson University. Author at RAND; 2012; “The Effect of the Civilian Economy on Recruiting and Retention”; RAND Corporation; https://militarypay.defense.gov/Portals/3/Documents/Reports/SR05_Chapter_2.pdf; Accessed 6-25-2023; DQ]
The evidence found in numerous empirical studies suggests that both recruiting and retention are significantly influenced by the state of the civilian economy. The civilian economy affects recruiting and retention in at least two ways: through the availability of civilian employment, as measured by the civilian unemployment rate; and by the potential earnings offered by the civilian sector, as measured by average civilian earnings. As the U.S. economy improves we can expect that the declining civilian unemployment rate and rising civilian real earnings will pose challenges for recruiting and for retention.