Military Exits Fill Talent Supply Gaps

Exiting military personnel are an important but often overlooked contributor to a region’s talent pool. These individuals are not always a large piece of a region’s overall labor pool, but they compose a significant and even critical supply for many skilled occupations.

Any region can benefit from exiting military personnel, even if a base is not located in that area. While some individuals after exiting may live near where they were last stationed, others may move to another area. As can be seen in the map above, the top regions for exits include both large metropolitan areas as well as areas containing or near large military bases.[1]

There were 153,000 military exits in the United States in fiscal year 2020.[2] While this is less than 1% of overall U.S. employment, exiting military personnel make up a significant portion of the available skilled labor for new demand found within many occupations.

The table below shows the twenty largest occupations[3] where military exits account for 10% or more of annual demand. “Annual projected demand” is the number of new entrants needed in an occupation due to growth as well as replacing workers who retired or moved into other careers.[4] The comparisons indicate many of these occupations would have supply shortfalls were it not for the exiting military.

In the top occupation, aircraft mechanics and service technicians, exiting military meet over half the 12,901 annual demand for new entrants into this occupation. This occupation typically requires postsecondary education for entry[5] and annual output from U.S. postsecondary schools is estimated at about 7,400.[6] Employers would face a deficit of new skilled entrants for this occupation were it not for the supply from military exits.

Electrical and electronic repairers of commercial and industrial equipment is another such occupation. Exiting military can fill over two-thirds of the annual demand of 4,993 new entrants for this occupation, which typically requires a postsecondary education as well as long-term on-the-job training. Annual output from U.S. postsecondary schools is about 1,500, indicating a large potential supply issue were it not for military exiting personnel with these skills.[7]

For some occupations, the annual military exits exceed expected demand. This is not necessarily a problem of excess supply, however, as related occupations exist for which these individuals would be good candidates. Exiting military for avionics technicians in fiscal year 2020 was 3,099, equal to 183% of demand for this occupation. Regardless, the underlying skills and attributes of avionic technicians makes these workers also candidates to fill openings in related occupations such as aerospace engineering and operations technologists and technicians or electrical and electronic engineering technologists and technicians, among others.[8]

To learn more about the Military Exits Analytic or any of the other data contained within JobsEQ, Chmura’s labor market data research technology platform, contact us today.

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[1] Military Exits data in this blog are found within JobsEQ and produced by Chmura from source data per the Department of Defense. The exits data have been crosswalked into Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) codes from Military Occupational Classification (MOC) code source data. The location of the exit is defined by the residential address for the individual upon completion of service.

[2] Fiscal year 2020 began on October 1, 2019 and ended on September 30, 2020.

[3] Occupations defined as six-digit SOC codes.

[4] Annual projected demand is calculated based upon 2022 employment figures.

[5] Typical education needed for entry per the BLS: https://www.bls.gov/emp/tables/education-and-training-by-occupation.htm.

[6] U.S. postsecondary school output per JobsEQ, using completions data per the National Center for Education Statistics (using the latest data, for the 2020-2021 academic year) with CIP-to-SOC flows modeled by Chmura.

[7] Ibid.

[8] JobsEQ houses a Willing & Able tool to identify such occupations; O*NET also identifies these opportunities via their “related occupations” found here: https://www.onetonline.org/link/summary/49-2091.00.