How Do Earnings Change When Reservists Are Activated? A Reconciliation of Estimates Derived from Survey and Administrative Data

Paco Martorell ; Jacob Alex Klerman ; David S Loughran

RAND Corporation

RAND Corporation

关键词: National Security;    Military Force Planning;    Economists;    Military Reserves;    Military Personnel;   

ISBN  :  9780833044747
RP-ID  :  TR-565-OSD

学科分类：自然科学（综合）

美国|英语

来源: RAND Corporation Published Research

【 摘 要 】

Among the many hardships of military activation is the possibility of losing earnings, and although some research points to such a loss, other research suggests that reservists in fact earn substantially more when they are activated. The authors examine earnings reports from the 2004 and 2005 Status of Forces Survey of Reserve Component Members (SOFS-R) and those from administrative data — the Social Security Administration and military pay records — to help reconcile these differing estimates. Broadly speaking, the administrative data indicate significant average earnings gains whereas the SOFS-R indicates significant average earnings losses. The authors propose several reasons for these opposite conclusions: different samples of reservists surveyed, the way earnings are defined, and the time period over which earnings comparisons are made. They also investigate several other possibilities, including reservists' misreporting or underreporting earnings, the effects of nonresponse bias, and errors in administrative data records.