Population Representation 2004 - Active Component Enlisted Applicants and Accessions

ACTIVE COMPONENT ENLISTED APPLICANTS AND ACCESSIONS

Characteristics of Active Component Non-Prior Service Applicants

In FY 2004, more than 309,000 individuals applied to serve in the active enlisted military force (Appendix Table A-1), down from nearly 353,000 in FY 2003. Applicants are those individuals who express an interest in joining one of the military services by visiting a recruiter and then following through with their intentions by completing background paperwork and submitting to a physical and/or taking the ASVAB. Not all applicants are eligible to enlist, for example certain medical conditions disqualify an applicant from serving in the military. Some applicants change their mind regarding enlistment before completing the process. Thus, not all applicants join one of the Services (those that do join are called accessions, see the next section for a discussion of Active Component accessions). The distribution of FY 2004 Active Component NPS applicants by race and gender is shown in Table 2.3 and by ethnicity and gender is shown in Table 2.4.

Table 2.3. Race and Gender of FY 2004 Active Component NPS Applicants,* by Service (Percent)
	Army	Navy	Marine Corps	Air Force	DoD
MALES
White	65.2	60.6	79.5	74.4	68.1
Black	12.4	22.7	9.7	15.9	14.9
American Indian & Alaskan Native	1.0	5.5	1.3	0.9	2.1
Asian	2.1	5.2	2.1	3.3	3.0
Native Hawaiian & Pacific Islander	1.8	1.4	1.2	1.5	1.6
Two or more races	1.0	1.8	1.0	2.1	1.3
Unknown	16.4	2.8	5.3	2.0	9.0
Total	100.0	100.0	100.0	100.0	100.0
FEMALES
White	54.6	52.2	71.3	65.9	57.6
Black	22.5	30.2	16.0	22.5	23.9
American Indian & Alaskan Native	1.6	5.8	2.2	1.2	2.6
Asian	2.5	4.9	2.4	3.4	3.2
Native Hawaiian & Pacific Islander	2.4	1.8	1.7	2.3	2.2
Two or more races	1.2	2.0	0.9	2.2	1.6
Unknown	15.3	3.1	5.5	2.6	8.8
Total	100.0	100.0	100.0	100.0	100.0
TOTAL
Male	78.5	79.6	91.2	72.4	79.8
Female	21.6	20.4	8.8	27.6	20.2
Columns may not add to total due to rounding. * Applicant data reported for FY 2004 are based on the DMDC edit version of the USMEPCOM file, which has been "cleaned" by the edit process. FY 2004 applicant data are consistent with Information Delivery System (IDS) data. Also see Appendix Table A-3 (Race/Ethnicity by Service and Gender).

Eighty percent of the applicants were male, of whom 68 percent were White, 15 percent Black, 2 percent American Indian and Alaskan Native, 3 percent Asian, 2 percent Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander, 1 percent multiracial, and 9 percent unknown. With respect to ethnicity, 14 percent of male applicants were Hispanic. For female applicants, approximately 58 percent were White, 24 percent Black, 3 percent American Indian and Alaskan Native, 3 percent Asian, 2 percent Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander, 2 percent multiracial, and 9 percent unknown. Sixteen percent of female applicants were Hispanic.

Table 2.4. Ethnicity and Gender of FY 2004 Active Component NPS Applicants,* by Service (Percent)
	Army	Navy	Marine Corps	Air Force	DoD
MALES
Hispanic	12.3	16.1	17.4	10.3	13.9
Not Hispanic	87.7	84.0	82.6	89.7	86.2
Total	100.0	100.0	100.0	100.0	100.0
FEMALES
Hispanic	14.8	18.0	19.6	12.9	15.5
Not Hispanic	85.2	82.0	80.4	87.1	84.5
Total	100.0	100.0	100.0	100.0	100.0
Columns may not add to total due to rounding. * Applicant data reported for FY 2004 are based on the DMDC edit version of the USMEPCOM file, which has been "cleaned" by the edit process. FY 2004 applicant data are consistent with Information Delivery System (IDS) data. Also see Appendix Table A-3 (Race/Ethnicity by Service and Gender).

Additional statistics on applicant characteristics (e.g., age, education levels, AFQT scores, and marital status, by gender, race, and ethnicity) are contained in Appendix A. See Tables A-1 through A-7.

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