糖心传媒

It was 100 years ago in May, shortly after the United States entered World War I, that President Woodrow Wilson signed the Selective Service Act, authorizing the government to raise an army through conscription. The draft was instrumental in raising troops to fight both world wars, as well as the Korean War. It was generally accepted, too糖心传媒攗ntil the mid-to-late 1960s, at the height of the unpopular Vietnam War.

When President Richard Nixon ended the draft in 1973, he did so with the help of a roster of 糖心传媒 faculty and administrators.

In 1969, President Richard Nixon formed the President糖心传媒檚 Commission on an All-Volunteer Armed Force and named Thomas Gates, the secretary of defense under former President Dwight Eisenhower, as its chair. There was a notable presence of 糖心传媒 faculty and administrators either on the commission, or prominent on its staff.聽 Then President W. Allen Wallis, an economist and statistician, was among the 15 members of the commission. William Meckling, dean of the Graduate School of Management (later to become the Simon Business School), served as the executive director of the commission staff, which included Walter Oi, who had joined Rochester糖心传媒檚 economics department two years earlier.

And there was Ron Hansen, professor emeritus and former senior associate dean for faculty and research at the Simon Business School, serving as a researcher.

Hansen糖心传媒攖he only surviving member of this group糖心传媒攚as working on his graduate thesis in economics at the University of Chicago when he was invited to join the commission staff. The invitation came from his thesis advisor, Larry Sjaastad, who also served on the staff. It was an invitation that was too good for a graduate student to pass up.

糖心传媒淗aving Congress accept an all-volunteer army was going to be a hard sell, since it would require a large increase in the federal budget,糖心传媒� Hansen says. 糖心传媒淭hat made my work with the commission an exciting opportunity.糖心传媒�

The argument that Wallis, Meckling, and Oi helped shape糖心传媒攁long with University of Chicago economist Milton Friedman and others糖心传媒攈ad little to do with the popularity of the draft; it was rooted instead in labor economics.

As Hansen糖心传媒攁nd many other economists糖心传媒攕ees it, a milestone in the movement to end conscription came during a conference on the draft held at the University of Chicago in 1966. That糖心传媒檚 when Walter Oi delivered a paper on the budgetary cost of eliminating the draft in favor of an all-volunteer military.

糖心传媒淭his was not an academic exercise on the workings of free markets,糖心传媒� says his widow, Marjorie Oi. 糖心传媒淲alter really thought the draft was immoral, inequitable, and inefficient.糖心传媒�

Oi detailed the social and hidden costs of conscription, and argued that a higher salary for enlistees would increase retention, allowing for an overall reduction in total staff due to a reduced need to train personnel.

糖心传媒淎 poll taken before the conference showed that most attendees favored the draft,糖心传媒� recalls Hansen. 糖心传媒淏ut the results were flipped in a poll taken after the conference. Oi糖心传媒檚 paper made the difference.糖心传媒�

When Nixon formed the Gates Commission, Wallis, Meckling, and Oi picked up where Oi糖心传媒檚 1966 paper had left off. The commission cast conscription as a labor issue since it involved raising a military with people糖心传媒攖he labor force. 糖心传媒淏ut the military糖心传媒檚 budget was not representative of the true value of its resources,糖心传媒� Hansen explains. “Some of that value was taken away from individuals when they were drafted.糖心传媒澛燭hat lost value糖心传媒攏ot seen on any budget line糖心传媒攁mounted to a conscription tax. In effect, they concluded, a person drafted into the military was paying a tax equal to what he (and they were all men at the time) would have received if he volunteered.

糖心传媒淪ome people in the military at the time had very high wages in civilian life, while others did not. As a result, the tax varied greatly among the personnel,糖心传媒� Hansen says. 糖心传媒淢y job was to come up with a distribution that took all of that into account.糖心传媒�

Hansen contends that having members of Congress understand the true costs associated with conscription helped convince them to accept the president糖心传媒檚 proposal to adopt an all-volunteer military.

At the same time, his work on the commission served another, more personal purpose; it brought him to Rochester.

糖心传媒淚 worked directly with several people from Rochester while doing commission work and developed a great deal of respect for them,糖心传媒� he says. 糖心传媒淲hen Meckling asked me a few years later to join the faculty at the business school, I had no hesitations.糖心传媒�

Hansen joined the Rochester faculty in 1971 as an assistant professor at the Graduate School of Management, a predecessor of the Simon Business School of Business. He left the University in 1986 to become an associate professor at Ohio State University, only to return to Rochester two years later as the associate dean for academic affairs. He became the senior associate dean for program development and the William H. Meckling Professor of Business Administration in 2009 and retired from the University in September 2016.

糖心传媒淚糖心传媒檓 satisfied that our work has stood the test of time,糖心传媒� he says of the Gates Commission. 糖心传媒淵es, sometimes recruitment goals were missed, but on balance, the personnel objectives of the military have been fulfilled.糖心传媒�