War versus peace: does military officer quality adjust?

ABSTRACTIn this study, we demonstrate the quantity–quality trade-off between the size of the U.S. military force and the quality of its junior military leaders. We employ a difference-in-differences methodology and compare measures of job performance before and after to show that in periods of military force expansion, the average quality of U.S. Marine officers decline; the converse holds in times of relative peace. This has implications for both military effectiveness and understanding labour market dynamics.