Why don't white middle class kids enlist?

Question

I work across the street from the only recruiting station for 20+ miles. In my county, there are three cities with populations over 20,000. Two have recruiting stations. The third doesn't. The one that doesn't is mostly white and has an income significantly about the national average. The ones that do are over 50% minorities and high poverty rates. Obviously I see a lot of poor minorities walking into this place. You could go 1-2 miles beyond the city limits and find yourself back in white upper middle class suburbia.
Keep in mind its the only place around to enlist... Why do I see so few middle class whites? Why do I see the recruiters at the shopping center with the dollar store and laundromat, not out at the mall with Abercrombie?

Actually Fly Boy, where I live, just beyond the city limits, is Conservative Republican by about a 4:1 margin. It is rare that a Democrat outside of the poor urban areas even gets 20% of the vote in an election... I never recall one winning in my 43 years on this earth.

Yes I mean upper middle class professionals. The $75,000+ plus families.

Answer 1

"Why don't white middle class kids enlist?"

I did. No regrets here.

Answer 2

She's not being racist - she's just saying what she sees. She's made no judgments based on race here - just that in her area, the city that is predominantly white and also middle class doesn't have a recruiting station.

Military is seen as a future and a career, and for many, a lifestyle. If your family is reasonably well-off, then you have other options that don't involve possibly being killed in other countries that would be more lucrative than a position in the military. The students with exceptional grades are the ones who enter West Point, that don't need to be recruited. The military is a way out of a community that may not seem to have any other options - you don't need a stellar academic record or connections or family money. It's a guranteed job with some ways of moving up in the system - a way to escape the problems of one's hometown, if there are any. And there's some sense of pride here - people are given the chance to learn new skills and defend what they believe needs to be defended or protected. You don't get that sort of thing at McDonalds.

Answer 3

I have been kicked out of those nice malls while recruiting in uniform. Mall security uses the "no soliciting" excuse to run off recruiters and the locals support them because most don't want recruiters harassing their precious children anyway. I have also been run off college campuses by security for talking to kids there. The police backs up security and they will politely ask you to leave once, after that they can arrest you and your chain of command probably won't help you get out of the mess you're in. Most of the high schools I worked at were run by administrations that viewed recruiters as a threat to their numbers, ie. making their percentages of graduates going to college go down. You have to work with the school officials because if you are banned from the school you might get hooked up with a General Letter of Reprimand, or worse.

Now to answer your question why don't white middle class kids enlist. You are implying that an obsolete myth still holds true, that only poor minorities go in the military. I enlisted a long time ago and at first I noticed almost everyone around me was also white and middle class, even as an 11B infantryman. But once you are in, you are all equal, and all Army green!

Answer 4

First of all IF the recruiting centers where at the mall next to Abercrombie, you'd be on here screaming about how much the military is spending in rent to have the station there! Rent is cheaper at the strip shopping centers next to the Dollar Store!

Secondly, in the 10 years I was in the military and then the 5 years married to a soldier, most, and I'd say 75% of my friends & fellow soldiers were from middle class, white families! I personally came from an upper middle class, white background!

Answer 5

I did and proud I did, by the way I am white and raised upper middle class. Why do a lot of lower income people or minorities join up. Maybe, they want money for college or training at a good technical school. Maybe, they want a direction in life away from the life that they see where they are at. Who knows? What difference does it make? If someone wants to serve their country, it is their choice. Nobody is dragged screaming into that office.

I thank God that they do go in and volunteer. I would much rather share a fox hole with someone that volunteered to be there than some rich kid that got drafted and doesn't care whether or not his buddy makes it home. If it wasn't for those volunteers, your so called rich, upper middle class, white kids would be getting drafted because a draft would be reinstated to keep our fighting forces manned up.

Sure the recruiters are out there looking for people. It is their job. They get poor evaluations if they don't reach their monthly/quarterly quotas. If I had their job I would be going wherever my training tells me to go. Most of your rich, middle class whites, are going to be going to college on daddy's dime or living at home leeching of the parents until daddy decides to put them out. Others don't have that privilege.

So, now that I have voiced my opinion, the next time you see that young man or woman walking out of the recruiting office, instead of asking why, why don't you walk over there, shake their hand and say THANK YOU! They will be the people standing up for your country, not that rich kid down the street.

Answer 6

I can understand where you're coming from, but I'm not sure you're correct.

Recruiters are sent out to "prospect" to different areas - they don't go to the same place everyday. Maybe you've just never run into a recruiter at the "nice" mall - only at the dollar store and the laundromat?

Where I live, we have a very nice mall (Potomac Mills) and there's a big recruiting station right inside that mall. There's a smaller station across the street from it in one of the smaller malls, next to a music store and a nurses' college.

The recruiters here go into all of the malls and neighborhoods to put up fliers and hand out cards - it's part of their job to do that, and to go different places instead of going to the same place(es) everyday.

Also, you might notice that the poor minorities that you see walking into your local recruiting office don't comprise the majority of our military. Hispanics make up 9% of the military, African Americans 17%.

The majority of our armed forces is made up of white people - and they have to come from somewhere. They're not all poor rednecks from West Virginia who have "no other options".

I think the biggest problem with middle class white youth is that they have a strong sense of entitlement - in other words, they are less willing to work for a career. They feel that their parents should be paying to send them to college, and that once they graduate college, there will be lots of jobs lined up for them immediately. They feel they are "too good" to get their hands dirty or join the military because they don't want to put up with "people yelling at them" and the like.

At least that's what a lot of the kids in my area (Northern Virginia) are like. Their parents are the same way ... "My kid is too good for the military. Let those with no options join."

Answer 7

That goes back to the 1950s when College Deferments started. Dick Cheyney would be the expert on that, he got 5 despite 4 being the rule. So the Recruiting Command started trolling the inner cities and rural areas for people who weren't College Bound.

I spent a tour as a Recruiter and I know that old habits die hard. No matter how much the military tries to change, as soon as things get tough they hed back for the markets they know.

Not that is all bad, the military can be the best thing that happens to you or the last. I'm retired and made out better than most who never went from my old neighborhood.

Answer 8

My husband just finished a three year recruiting stint in a large mid-west city. My personal opinion is most upper-middle class children are spoiled. It's not that they wouldn't join the military, it's that they don't think they could live without their ipod's and video games for the 3 months it takes to get through training. Many will probably disagree with me, but from experience it's true. As long as Mommy and Daddy are going to pay for college and let them live at home, while providing an allowance for $200 sweat suits you will not see the spoiled little kids enlisting. As for why you see the recruiters at those places, lol, to be honest it's usually to shop. My husband always made his numbers (Gawd, hate that saying) but most of his time was spent giving presentations to high school physics classes, or volunteering for coaching.

JMO, but until Jr. and Princess have to make it on their own you just aren't going to see them getting a job that takes ****!

Answer 9

I was a middle class kiid when I enlisted. I had 3-1/2 yrs of college but gave it up to enlist. Most of the enlisted I have had the honor of serving with have also been middle class.

Tell me this, why do liberals have such a problem with the poor bettering themselves by going into military service? They complain about the proportions not being equal. Well, the military just goes to show that ANYONE can be a success if they set their mind to it. Maybe it's the fact that they see a welfare check going out the window.

Answer 10

Actually, the "white middle class" is over represented in the military. The "urban lower class" is under represented.

The subject has been analyzed in depth.....

http://www.heritage.org/Research/NationalSecurity/cda06-09.cfm

Who Are the Recruits? The Demographic Characteristics of U.S. Military Enlistment, 2003–2005
by Tim Kane, Ph.D.
Center for Data Analysis Report #06-09

Answer 11

Just like the police and firemen, it seems that recruiting in minority neighborhoods is more aggressive because those groups do not tend to apply/enlist without being heavily courted. As you must know, recruiting stations are not the only means by which to enlist.

By chance, have you noticed the race of most of the seriously wounded from Iraq?