Tuesday, June 12, 2007

War, Economics, Altruism, Volunteers, and Grief

The horrors of war are well known to most individuals.  The U.S.’ current military operations are no exception to this known horror. But just why, exactly, beyond the loss individual families have had to bear when one of their sons, daughters, fathers, mothers, or lovers, has been killed, is the general public so upset about these deaths?

At The Becker-Posner Blog, Gary Becker and Richard Posner are considering this, from an economic standpoint.  Richard Posner’s input to this discussion is titled Ex Ante Compensation for Military Death and his post, and the comments which follow, make for interesting reading.  From Posner’s post.

The public is upset by the casualties that our soldiers are suffering in the Iraq war, and it might seem that their upset would cause no puzzlement even to an economist. But there is an economic puzzle. It is this. Ours is an all-volunteer military. No one is forced to join. Everyone who does join realizes that he may find himself in a combat zone. This is an expected cost of military employment and in a competitive labor market will be reflected in the wage. That is, the wage rate in a competitive labor market will compensate a worker for any risks that the particular employment can be expected to create--a proposition that goes back to Adam Smith. If the risk materializes, the employee has no cause to complain, provided it was the risk that he understood the job involved or should have understood it involved when he signed up for it, because he was compensated in advance. Yet that is not how the public views our military casualties. That is the economic puzzle which I address.

Gary Becker’s input to this discussion is titled Comment on Military Pay, and is also worth your time in reading.  From Becker’s post.

Although the pay required to attract volunteers rose after casualties began to appear in large numbers in Iraq, it did not rise by a large amount. Yet even small increases in the probability of losing one’s life are valued highly when young persons are asked to take on the risks found in different civilian occupations. When directly applied to military risks, these estimates suggest that if the Iraq war increased the chances of dying to a typical new member of the American military force by one percent per year of service, this would require about a $3000 increase in pay for each year of service for each person in the military. The amount would be considerably higher for those who knew they would be posted into military action in Iraq, and would be higher in general if one percent is lower than the true risk.

The comments associated with Becker’s post also are an interesting read.

Posted by John Venlet on 06/12 at 09:02 AM
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