The Persistent Deficit of Militia Officers in the Swiss Armed Forces: An Opportunity Cost Explanation

Abstract

The Swiss Armed Forces are suffering from a structural deficit of militia officers despite good pay and a general supportive attitude in the population. Whereas, prior studies have focused on motivation to explain understaffing in armed forces, we offer an alternative approach based on opportunity cost. We model decision alternatives both within and outside a military organization, taking private sector employment as the reference point. We then monetize opportunity costs of leisure, fringe benefits, and private sector income not compensated. Our results suggest that in terms of opportunity cost, service as a militia officer is the least attractive option, an effect that we believe explains the persistent staff deficit. Implications of these findings for the literature and recruitment policy are discussed.

Keywords:

• Opportunity cost
• military recruitment
• officer
• general conscription
• Swiss Armed Forces

Notes

1. We thank an anonymous reviewer for bringing this point to our attention.

2. Although foreign nationals and permanent residents together account for 24% of Switzerland’s population, only citizens are eligible to serve in any service alternative.

3. A small fraction of conscripts may serve all of their days at a stretch if certain criteria are met and positions are available. Since the overwhelming majority of SAF personnel and particularly the militia officers serve in the traditional form by annual refresher courses, we do not factor the ‘at a stretch’ option into the analysis.

4. Female citizens can volunteer for any military function, but not for the civilian service. Hence, admission to the civilian service is effectively restricted to male citizens, such that it is not a relevant decision alternative for female citizens. However, since only 0.7% of SAF personnel is female (Swiss Federal Department of Defense 2016) the analysis is unlikely to be significantly influenced by this imbalance.

5. Under special circumstances, militia officers can be required to serve for more than 600 days. Since such additional service days would increase opportunity cost beyond the rates we calculate, our analysis is conservative.

6. As of May 2017, one Swiss franc is valued at approximately one U.S. dollar in the foreign exchange market.

7. In Switzerland, an individual’s weekly workload in the private sector must not exceed 50 h (Federal law on work in the industry, crafts and trade – SR 822.11). Note that this regulation does not apply to the Armed Forces. While a firm may persuade employees to not record hours worked beyond this threshold (e.g. in consulting or investment banking), such behavior is not only illegal, but also not representative of the majority of the workforce. We therefore do not consider this effect for our analysis.

8. Further procedural description and auxiliary calculation is available from the corresponding author.

9. We assume that these salaries are also earned by those without a formal university degree but materially equal professional training that provides them with at least the same, if not a superior, level of productivity.

10. To simplify the analysis, we assume that all officers receive this supplement, since the total number of officers with a rank higher than captain is relatively low compared to the combined number of lieutenants, first lieutenants, and captains.

11. Subject to traveling in uniform and presentation of marching orders. Privates and NCOs travel in second, officers in first class.

12. Auxiliary calculation is available from the corresponding author.

13. We thank an anonymous reviewer for drawing our attention to these issues and providing us with valuable arguments.