Competition in educational benefits from civilian employers →

The military may face additional competition from civilian employers who are increasingly willing to pay for their employees' education.

Large companies like the oil giant BP, accounting firm Deloitte, tech behemoth Google, and even food-maker Smuckers either provide discounts to select courses at eligible colleges or cover the full cost of tuition. An employer survey from 2013 found that 61 percent of companies make available some type of tuition-assistance program. Parcel firm UPS offers its employees a $15,000 tuition credit and cut deals with regional colleges in Illinois and Kentucky to provide its workers free courses.

One of the main benefits of military service is access to tuition assistance and the Post 9-11 GI Bill. If other companies offer similar benefits, the military may need to increase compensation in other areas to attract and retain servicemembers.

Data-driven personnel decisions →

The internal, hierarchical military personnel system requires constant attention.

Large-scale data collection and analysis will eventually provide the armed forces with a far richer understanding of their human capital than has ever been available before, paving the path for the services to take a fresh look at the qualifications and skills necessary for commissioning into the military. How we choose our officers will lay the groundwork for the management of the force of the future. Given the challenges that lie ahead, it is something we cannot afford to get wrong.

Send military members to Civilian schools →

The Pentagon wants to send more officers to earn graduate degrees at top-notch civilian universities, a key piece of soon-to-be released personnel reforms that could fundamentally alter the career tracks of senior military leaders.

Having spent several years in civilian graduate school, I know how beneficial this opportunity can be. But, the issue isn't how to replace the war colleges. As long as the military operates graduate schools – Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) and the Air Force Institute of Technology (AFIT) – it will be difficult to justify sending members to civilian institutions.

Bernanke on military service and labor market outcomes →

“The evidence appears to be that there really is not an advantage,” Bernanke told a crowd at a Brookings Institution event in Washington. “If you go into the military at age 18 — versus an identical person who stays in the private sector and takes a private sector job — 10 years later, if you leave the military, your skills and wages are probably not going to be quite as high on average as a private sector person.”

Military Officers and College Degrees →

Some have argued that jobs in the private sector have inflated degree requirements. Now, a junior officer argues in the Wall Street Journal that "a college degree in 2015 no longer signals—let alone guarantees—much of anything." And, therefore, the military should no longer require college degrees for officers. I do not find his arguments convincing.

Also, the statistics he cites likely include warrant officers which drives the percent of officers with bachelor's degrees down to 83 percent. Only by exception may a officer without a bachelor's degree hold a commission. In the Air Force, which no longer has warrant officers, all commissioned officers hold at least a bachelor's degree and nearly 60 percent hold a graduate or professional degree. And, through promotion incentives and tuition assistance, 10 percent of the enlisted population hold at least a bachelor's degree and another 24 percent have an associate's degree.