Trends in gender and racial equity in retention and promotion of military officers

Abstract

This paper builds on our earlier research to investigate the extent to which there is a pattern of increasing or decreasing gender and racial equity in retention and promotion rates over time. Regression analysis techniques are utilized to estimate the normalized. Year-to-year retention and promotion’s rates for individual co- horts. Results indicate no significant racial impacts on retention. The differential between the retention rates of men and women~ small but statistically significant, with men having higher retention rates than women. Analysis of promotion rates shows that Blacks are promoted at slightly lower rates than Whites. After the fourth year, men have consistently higher promotion rates than women. We hypothesize that lack of internal organizational supports for family roles may lead to the differential in retention and promotion between men and women.