TY - JOUR

T1 - Effects of mandatory military and alternative community service on wages and other socioeconomic outcomes

AU - Puhani, Patrick A.

AU - Sterrenberg, Margret K.

N1 - Funding Information: A previous version of this article was part of the Ph.D. thesis of Margret K. Sterrenberg, https://doi.org/10.15488/8492 (as a chapter co‐authored with Patrick A. Puhani), and a more recent previous version has been issued as IZA Discussion Paper No. 14352, Bonn (and other discussion paper series). We thank Wolfgang Meyer, Maresa Sprietsma, Stephan L. Thomsen, the editor and anonymous referees for helpful comments. This paper was supported by the German Research Foundation (, DFG) under the DFG Priority Program 1646, Education as a Lifelong Process. The analysis is based on data from the National Educational Panel Study (NEPS): Starting Cohort 6 – Adults, mainly doi: 10.5157/NEPS:SC6:1.0.0 , but for volunteer work and sample attrition also doi: 10.5157/NEPS:SC6:7.0.0 , doi: 10.5157/NEPS:SC6:12.0.1 . From 2008 to 2013, these NEPS data were collected as part of the Framework Program for the Promotion of Empirical Educational Research funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF). Since 2014, the NEPS survey has been carried out by the Leibniz Institute for Educational Trajectories (LIfBi) at the University of Bamberg in cooperation with a nationwide network. Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft

PY - 2022/7/5

Y1 - 2022/7/5

N2 - In this paper, we estimate the effects of mandatory military and alternative community service by exploiting the post-cold war decrease in the need for soldiers causing a substantial number of potential conscripts not to be drafted into the German military. The study is based on retrospective survey information for 655 men from the 1970 to 1984 birth cohorts collected in 2009/10 and after, using previously unavailable information on degree of fitness in the military's medical exam as a control variable. We test for the effects of mandatory service on wages, employment, volunteer work, marriage/partnership status, and satisfaction with various aspects of life. Whilst many estimates are not statistically significant, for the younger birth cohorts 1976 to 1984, we find some evidence of a lower hourly wage due to mandatory military service, which shows a negative point estimate of −15% with a large confidence interval of between −30 and −0.2%. This interval estimate is consistent with previous findings for the United States, Denmark, and the Netherlands. However, we also find statistically significant estimates for both military and alternative community service to increase participation in volunteer work, a hitherto rarely explored effect.

AB - In this paper, we estimate the effects of mandatory military and alternative community service by exploiting the post-cold war decrease in the need for soldiers causing a substantial number of potential conscripts not to be drafted into the German military. The study is based on retrospective survey information for 655 men from the 1970 to 1984 birth cohorts collected in 2009/10 and after, using previously unavailable information on degree of fitness in the military's medical exam as a control variable. We test for the effects of mandatory service on wages, employment, volunteer work, marriage/partnership status, and satisfaction with various aspects of life. Whilst many estimates are not statistically significant, for the younger birth cohorts 1976 to 1984, we find some evidence of a lower hourly wage due to mandatory military service, which shows a negative point estimate of −15% with a large confidence interval of between −30 and −0.2%. This interval estimate is consistent with previous findings for the United States, Denmark, and the Netherlands. However, we also find statistically significant estimates for both military and alternative community service to increase participation in volunteer work, a hitherto rarely explored effect.

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85126741813&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1111/kykl.12301

DO - 10.1111/kykl.12301

M3 - Article

AN - SCOPUS:85126741813

VL - 75

SP - 488

EP - 507

JO - KYKLOS

JF - KYKLOS

SN - 0023-5962

IS - 3

ER -