Active
Component Enlisted Force
Race & Ethnicity |
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The military attracts
and retains higher proportions of Blacks and "Other" minority
groups but lower proportions of Hispanics than are in the civilian labor
force. As Table 3.3 indicates, the overall proportion of enlisted minorities
was higher than in the civilian labor force in FY 1999 (37 and 30 percent,
respectively). While Hispanics were underrepresented among enlisted
members (9 percent versus 13 percent), the Services have made gains
since 1987, when only 4 percent of the enlisted force was Hispanic.
Changes over time in the percentage of Black enlisted members in each Service are shown in Figure 3.3. Black soldiers in the Army increased from 18 percent in FY 1973 to a high of 33 percent in FY 1981. That proportion decreased to 30 percent by the mid-1980s, in large part due to an increase in entrance standards and the Army's decision not to renew enlistment contracts of low-scoring members who entered during the ASVAB misnorming. The proportion of Blacks in the Army has remained stable since FY 1993 at 30 percent. The Marine Corps
has experienced slight decreases in Blacks during recent years, paralleling
the drop in minority accessions in FY 1991 and the concomitant decrease
in the propensity to enlist among Black youth. Black male propensity
declined 13 percentage points between 1991 and 1999.
[1] The Navy, on the other hand, exhibited a consistent long-term
increase in the proportion of Blacks, from 8 percent in FY 1973 to 20
percent in FY 1999. In all Services, the percentage of female members
who are Black significantly exceeds the percentage of male members who
are Black (Appendix Table B-25). In FY
1999, active duty Hispanic enlisted members were a smaller part of the
enlisted force than of the civilian labor force in the 1844 age
group (9 percent and 13 percent, respectively). The highest representation
of Hispanics was in the Marine Corps (13 percent). The proportions
of "Other" minority individuals in the Army and Navy were
similar (7 and 9 percent, respectively), while the Marine Corps and
Air Force had somewhat less (5 percent for both).
[1] Memorandum
from Alphonso Maldon, Jr., Assistant Secretary of Defense (Force Management
Policy), Subject: 1999 Youth Attitude Tracking Study, January 11,
2000. |
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