Intergenerational occupational inheritance in the Department of Defense.

Abstract

This thesis examined military service as an intergenerational occupation by determining the proportions of nonjuniors, other juniors and career juniors in the Department of Defense in 1979- Immobility ratios were calculated for DoD and various subgroups based on rank, sex, race, and years of service to determine whether juniors are represented in the military in similar proportions to their composition in the population at large. Multiple Classification Analysis was used to test and analyze behavioral and socioeconomic differences among junior groups. Discriminant analysis was used to statistically distinguish among the three junior status categories and measure the success of correctly classifying officer and enlisted respondents in their appropriate junior group. Conclusions reached were: DoD exhibits strong intergenerational occupational inheritance tendencies when compared to most salary or wage earning civilian occupations; the three junior groups differ significantly in behavior and socioeconomic characteristics; junior status explains very little variation for the dependent variables examined after controlling for the effects of branch of service, sex, race and length of service.