Alair MacLean

The Things They Carry: Combat, Disability and Unemployment among US Men.

Sociologists have long recognized that historical events, such as wars, depressions, and natural disasters, influence trajectories of people’s lives and reproduce or alter social structures. This article extends that line of research. Using data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, I test three accounts regarding how combat exposure in war affects men’s ability to work. The direct cumulative disadvantage account posits that war negatively affects servicemen who see combat, regardless of their pre-combat characteristics. The moderated cumulative disadvantage account suggests that combat most negatively affects men who had lower status before they fought. The turning point account suggests the reverse: combat most negatively affects men who had greater status before they fought. Findings suggest that with regard to disability and unemployment, the effects of combat exposure in war are most consistent with the direct cumulative disadvantage account.

The Pervasive Role of Rank in the Health of U.S. Veterans

The following article tests the hypothesis that veterans have better health if they were officers when they were in the U.S. military than if they served in the enlisted ranks. It examines this hypothesis by presenting results from logistic regressions that are based on four surveys: the National Survey of Veterans, the Survey of Retired Military, the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, and the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study. In all four of these surveys, the evidence is consistent with the hypothesis that military rank is associated with health, particularly among veterans who served longer. It also suggests that the health gradient by rank is independent of similar gradients by education and income as well as health differences by race. These findings indicate that health may be influenced not just by differences in civilian society but also by those in the military.

The Social Fallout of a High-Inequality Regime

T spectacular takeoff in income inequality in the united States commenced long ago and has now become a fixed and seemingly stable foundation of our contemporary social life. Although there has been much research on the sources and causes of the takeoff, we know less about how people have come to forge new ways of living in the context of our high-inequality regime. How has rising income inequality changed the rules by which people come to participate in the key social institutions of our time (i.e., the family, the military, the prison, and the educational system)? How has it changed the rules by which rewards are allocated in the labor market? And how has it changed the lifestyles we lead, the attitudes we hold, and the politics in which we believe? The purpose of this volume is to sketch out the “social fallout” of rising inequality across these various domains and to provide

Who Supports U.S. Veterans and Who Exaggerates Their Support

Support for U.S. military personnel appears high, but does it extend to veterans after service ends? This study evaluates public support for social engagement with veterans and spending on recent military veterans’ health care and estimates the extent of socially desirable reporting on these forms of support. It uses a list experiment to identify the extent of socially desirable reporting on topics. Findings demonstrate that the public offers overwhelming support for spending on veterans’ health care and social engagement with the group, but they somewhat overstate this support. Support differs by age, race, and political ideology, and social desirability bias varies by race, political ideology, and prior military experience. African Americans express the lowest levels of support for returning veterans and the greatest extent of socially desirable reporting on that support. This is despite generally high rates of service and greater labor market returns to that service among this demographic group.

Income Inequality and the Veteran Experience

Previous researchers have evaluated how the dramatic rise in income inequality has affected the members of various groups of workers, such as those defined by gender, union status, and educational attainment. Yet apparently no researchers have yet explored how this increase may have affected people grouped by previous military service. This chapter addresses this gap by assessing trends in wage inequality between male veterans and nonveterans, and among veterans between 1979 and 2010. The findings suggest that similar to other groups, veterans have experienced decreased between-group inequality and increased within-group inequality and that these changes may stem not just from period but also from cohort effects.

Skills Mismatch? Military Service, Combat Occupations, and Civilian Earnings

Research has evaluated the impact of military service on socioeconomic outcomes, but little research has assessed the association between such outcomes and military occupations. The following article examines this relationship by analyzing the National Longitudinal Study of Youth 1979. It evaluates whether military occupations produce associations that are consistent with hypotheses based on theories of skills mismatch, selection, or turning points. Contrary to expectations, veterans of combat occupations did not have different earnings from those of other occupations, which suggests that any apparent effects of combat exposure reflect neither skills mismatch nor selection into these roles. Yet veterans earned less than nonveterans at the same years of combined military and civilian experience, regardless of occupation. These findings indicate that employers did not value time in the military as much as time in the civilian labor market.