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38 Armed Forces & Soc'y 5 (2012)

handle is hein.journals/amdfcsad38 and id is 1 raw text is: 





Articles


                                                           Armed Forces & Society
                                                                    38(1) 5-26
               The   orl W a    11© The Author(s) 2012
The World War II                                           Rpn   n  e  so
                                                           Reprints sand permission:
                                                   sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav
Veteran         Advantage?                           DOI: 10.11 77/0095327X 10390463
                                                             http://afs.sagepub.com
A Lifetime                                                        *SAGE

Cross-Sectional

Study of Social

Status Attainment


Irving  Smith   III', Kris Marsh2, and David R. Segal2





Abstract
The impact of military service on the status attainment of World War II veterans has
been studied since the 1950s; however, the research has failed to come to any con-
sensus with regard to their level of attainment. Analyses have focused on cross-
sectional or longitudinal data without considering the effects of service over the life
course. The authors argue that World War  II veterans, regardless of race, have
greater attainment, measured in terms of education, income, and occupational pres-
tige, over their lifetimes than nonveterans. They use census data from the 1950
through 2000 Public Use Microdata Sample. The authors find that military service
afforded white veterans significant advantages through their early and middle working
years; however, their nonveteran peers eventually caught up. They also find that black
veterans receive more of a social status advantage relative to black nonveterans, and
military service helps to close the socioeconomic gap between blacks and whites.


Keywords
race, World War  II, education, occupation, income


'U.S. Military Academy, West Point, NY, USA
2University of Maryland, College Park, College Park, MD, USA

Corresponding Author:
Kris Marsh, University of Maryland, Department of Sociology, 21 12 Art-Sociology Building, College Park,
MD 20742-13 15, USA
Email: kmarsh@socy.umd.edu

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