Technical Paper Series

Congressional Budget Office

Washington, DC

FAMILY STATUS OF 

ENLISTED PERSONNEL

John Cadigan

Principal Analyst

Congressional Budget Office

August 2000

2000-6

Technical papers in this series are preliminary and are circulated to stimulate discussion

and critical comment. These papers are not subject to CBO’s formal review and editing

processes. The analysis and conclusions expressed in them are those of the author and

should not be interpreted as those of the Congressional Budget Office. Any reference to

this paper in other publications should be cleared with the author. Papers in this series

can be obtained by sending an email to techpapers@cbo.gov.
FAMILY STATUS OF ENLISTED PERSONNEL

INTRODUCTION

Family patterns for military personnel have changed dramatically since the

institution of the All-Volunteer Force in 1973. Foremost among those changes has

been an increase in the proportion of enlisted members with families. The percentage

of enlisted service members who are married rose from approximately 40 percent in

fiscal year 1973 to a peak of 57 percent in fiscal year 1994. Since then, that

proportion has dropped slightly, to over 53 percent in fiscal year 1998. 

The changing structure of the force raises some difficult policy questions,

particularly regarding how to best support young military families. First-term service

members and their spouses consistently cite finances and housing as their most

pressing concerns. A 1993 study, “Family Service and Initial Term of Service,”

conducted by the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense (Personnel and

Readiness) found that 65 percent of first-term married service members, and 82.5

percent of their spouses, report having difficulty paying their bills.

Determining the best way to support junior military members remains an

important challenge. Before examining this policy issue, analysts need to address

some basic factual issues, including:

1. Are increases in the number of enlisted members with families consistent with

trends in the civilian sector? 

2. Do military members with dependents perform differently than those without

dependents (so-called dependents status)? 

The following research is intended to shed light on those two questions.

Regarding family status, we find that military personnel are more likely to be married

and to have children than their civilian counterparts are even when controlling for a

variety of demographic factors. Regarding performance, we find that soldiers with

families are less likely to complete their initial term of service than those without.

However, soldiers with families are more likely to continue past their initial term of

service. 
Figure 1: Percentage of People Who Are Married, Military 

Versus Civilian

40%

45%

50%

55%

60%

65%

70%

19771979198119831985198719891991199319951997

Year

Percentage

Military

Civilian

Source: Data from Population Representation in the Military Services , 1998 OASD 

Accession Policy Office.

DIFFERENCES IN THE MARITAL STATUS OF MILITARY PERSONNEL

AND CIVILIANS

Trends over Time

The percentage of active-duty enlisted personnel who are married has risen

in each of the services since 1980. In contrast, the percentage of married civilians

ages 18 to 44 has declined significantly over the same period. In fact, the percentage

of married military personnel has exceeded that of the civilian population in each

year since 1993 (see Figure 1). 

The difference in marriage trends may be explained in several ways. First,

the average age for enlisted personnel has increased from approximately 25 in fiscal

year 1980 to over 27 in fiscal year 1998, and as people age, they are more likely to

marry. So the increase in age of the military group may be responsible for the

increase in percentage married. Also, other differences between military personnel

and civilians with respect to demographic factors including income, education, and

sex may account for the difference. 

Alternatively, practices or policies enacted by the military may either make

marriage more attractive to military personnel or lead those who are more likely to
1. See, for example, Segal (1986), Morrison, Vernez, Grissmer, and McCarthy (1989), and Schumm,

Bell, and Tran (1993). These studies also found higher marriage rates for those in the military. The

need to control for age was demonstrated in Adedeji (1992), which found that 29 percent of enlisted

members ages 17 to 24 were married, compared with only 17 percent of similarly aged civilians. 

2. The March Supplement to the CPS focuses on a variety of demographic factors, including race, age,

marital status, income, military service, educational attainment, and number of children. The Family

Database maintained by DMDC combines information from the Active-Duty Master Database and the

DEERS Database to generate demographic information about military members and their families.

get married into military service. The structure of military compensation, with its

focus on pay, allowances, and the provision of certain goods in kind, may make

military service more attractive than jobs in the private sector for individuals with

families. Also, policies for those already in the military may favor members with

families. For example, military members with families are offered either family

quarters or larger allowances than single members. Other benefits that differ

according to dependents status (including transportation and travel allowances,

separation pay, etc.) may encourage a greater percentage of enlisted personnel to

marry. 

Differences Today

While previous research indicates that enlisted personnel are more likely to

be married than their civilian counterparts,1 we find that those differences persist

today even when controlling for a variety of demographic factors. This can be seen

both in comparison of military and civilian data at aggregate levels and in more

rigorous analysis of individual-level data. To establish this result, we compared data

on marriage in the military obtained from the Defense Manpower Data Center

(DMDC) with data drawn from the March Supplement to the Current Population

Survey (CPS) over the 1995-1999 time frame.2

 To control for age, we calculated the

percentage of males in the military who are married for each age from 18 to 30 as

well as the percentage for two civilian comparison groups. The first group consists

of the entire pool of responses to the March Supplement (over 22,000 observations

for each year between 1995 and 1999). The second group, a subset of the

supplement, consists of male high school graduates who were employed full time

(over 2,500 observations for each year). That subset was used to control for
Figure 2: Percentage Married in the Military Compared 

with Civilian Groups, 1995-1999

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

18 20 22 24 26 28 30

Age

Percentage

Military

Civilian

Civilian Subsample

Sources: Civilian data is based on 1995-1999 averages from the March 

Supplement to the CPS. Military data comes from the Family Database 

i t i d b DMDC

differences between the military and civilian populations with respect to sex,

education, and employment. The results are displayed in Figure 2.

Here we see, as expected, that the percentage married in each group increases

with age. At age 18, the percentage married in each of the groups is nearly identical

(2.6 percent for the military, 2.5 percent for the civilian group, and 2.8 percent for the

subsample). For each year after age 18, however, the military group has the highest

percentage married. This suggests that even after controlling for age (by comparing

people of similar ages across groups), education, employment status, and sex (by

comparing different groups), military members are more likely to be married than

their civilian counterparts. We also found differences in marital status based on

military service using more sophisticated and rigorous statistical techniques, which

are described below.
Regression Analysis of Marital Status

In this section we address the question of whether variation in marital status

is related to variation in military status in a statistically significant fashion. Again,

we used data on civilians from the 1999 March Supplement to the CPS and data on

military personnel from the Family Database maintained by DMDC. Because

marriage is a binary variable (one is either married or not), we used the logistic

model, which assumes that the probability of an outcome (in this case marriage) is

related to a set of explanatory variables according to the following form:

ln [P/(1-P)] =  + x

Where:

P = the probability that the event occurred

ln = the natural logarithm 

 = a constant term 

x = a vector of independent variables

 = a vector of parameters to be estimated

The ratio P/(1-P), called the odds ratio, is simply the odds in favor of the event

occurring. The natural logarithm of the odds ratio is called the “logit,” hence the

term logistic model. In our model, the dependent variable was marital status (1 if

married, 0 otherwise), and the independent variables were the constant, age in years,

sex (1 if male, 0 otherwise), income in dollars per year, high school diploma (HSD,

1 if had a high school diploma, 0 otherwise), and civilian status (civstat, 1 if not in

the military, 0 otherwise). The regression output is as follows:

ln P/(1-P) = -6.3 + .27 Age - .54 Sex + (3.51E-6) Income -.27 HSD - .92 Civstat

P-value (.0001) (.0001) (.0001) (.0001) (.0001) (.0001)

P-value for Score statistic with 5 DF =.0001

Percentage of concordant predicted probabilities and observed responses = 77.8

The coefficient on civilian status is negative and significant well below the

5 percent level. This is sufficient to establish a correlation between marriage and

military status in this data set. However, correlation does not imply causation.
Stated differently, the correlation between military status and marriage does not

imply that military service causes marriage. In any event, these results suggest that

even after a variety of factors are controlled for, being in the military is associated

with a higher probability of marriage. Each of the other variables contained in the

regression is significant and has a sign consistent with expectations. Also, the Score

statistic (which tests for the joint significance of the explanatory variables) and the

high percentage of concordant predicted and observed responses (which assess the

extent to which higher predicted probabilities are associated with more observances

of marriage) suggest the model fits the data well. We estimated two other models,

the Probit model and the linear probability model, and both generated similar results.

To gain some insight into the magnitude of the effect of military status on the

probability of marriage, we calculated the probability of marriage predicted by the

model for a male high school graduate, with the mean age and income, who was not

in the military. We compared that with the prediction associated with a person of the

same demographic characteristics who was in the military. The probability of

marriage estimated from the model for the person not in the military was 16.4

percent, whereas the probability for a person with the same characteristics who was

assumed to be in the military was 33 percent. This suggests a very strong effect, but

the result should be interpreted cautiously. The actual proportion of 23-year-old

military males who were married in 1999 was approximately 49 percent, which is

much higher than the probability predicted here. (To generate specific predictions

from the logistic model we had to specify a number of demographic characteristics

and “create” an observation for which there is no clear analog in our actual data set.

This is a limitation commonly associated with the analysis of binary data.) 

Taken as a whole, those results--in conjunction with the established findings

of previous research--strongly suggest that members of the military are more likely

to be married than are civilians. Differences in marriage rates for military personnel

and civilians cannot be explained solely on the basis of demographic factors. 

As noted earlier, there are at least two interpretations of this result. First, the

military may be drawing more married individuals into service. If so, we would

expect to see that the percentage of accessions who were married was larger than the
Figure 3: Percentage of Married Non-Prior Service Accessions 

by Age Compared with Civilian Group, 1995-1999

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30

Age

Percentage Married

Military Accessions

Civilian

Source: Based on data from the Department of Defense.

percentage of similar civilians. But that is not the case. For the period from 1995 to

1999, the percentage of Non-Prior Service (NPS) accessions who were married was

less than or equal to the percentage married in the civilian population as estimated

from the CPS for each age between 18 and 30 (see Figure 3).

This suggests a second interpretation: rather than drawing more married

people into service, aspects of military service may make it more likely for those

already in the military to marry. Although this is not conclusive evidence because

the military may be drawing in a higher proportion of people who intend to marry but

have not done so at the time of accession, or because those who marry are more

likely to stay, it does suggest that the military environment, including practices and

policies that favor the acquisition of dependents, may be influencing young military

members’ decision to marry. 
3. Morrison, Vernez, Grissmer, and McCarthy (Rand, 1989) found that for the Army, couples have more

children than comparable civilians and have them at an earlier age. This result was found to generalize

to all services as reported by the Military Family Resource Center in November 1998. 

DIFFERENCES IN THE DEPENDENTS STATUS OF MILITARY

PERSONNEL AND CIVILIANS

In addition to being more likely to be married, military personnel are more

likely to have children than are civilians of similar ages and education levels.

Unfortunately, research comparing the number of children in civilian and military

families has been limited. The issue is complicated by practices in the military that

make it difficult to distinguish between dependents who are children and those who

are not. Specifically, in the military, the number of dependents “sponsored” by a

service member includes a spouse, dependent parents, and children. What research

has been done, however, suggests that significant differences exist between members

of the military and civilians.3

 

As was the case when analyzing marital decisions, it is important to control

for demographic factors including age, sex, and educational attainment. To examine

differences between the military and civilian populations with respect to

childbearing, we examined data from the March Supplement to the CPS from 1995

to 1999, and compared it with data from the Family Database maintained by DMDC.

For the results below, a member of the military was counted as having a child under

the age of 18 if the member was married and the sponsor of at least two dependents,

or single and the sponsor of one or more dependents. Although this may introduce

some biases into the results presented below (by including those with more than one

dependent but without a child), it seemed the most reasonable way to deal with the

limitations of the data set. Even so, the results must be interpreted cautiously. For

each of three groups (the military, the CPS population as a whole, and a subset of the

CPS consisting of male high school graduates employed full time), Figure 4 presents

the percentage with children under 18 for the period from 1995 to 1999.
Figure 4: Percentage of People in Three Groups Who 

Have Children Under 18, 1995-1999

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

18 20 22 24 26 28 30

Age

Percentage

Military

Civilian

Civilian Subsample

Source: Based on data from the CPS March Supplement and DMDC's Family 

Database. 

The military group had a higher percentage of individuals with children under

18 than the subsample for each age between 18 and 30. Although differences at the

lower end of the spectrum were small, this result suggests that military personnel are

more likely to have children than are a similar group of civilians. Relative to the

entire population surveyed for the CPS, military rates were slightly smaller at the low

end of the spectrum but much higher for each age after 23. The size of the

differences at the middle and upper age ranges suggests that even if we were able to

control for the possible bias introduced in the way the data for the military were

calculated, the overall result (military members are more likely to have children)

would remain. This result is supported by more rigorous statistical analysis, which

is presented below. 
Regression Analysis of Dependents Status

In this section we address the question of whether military service influences

the chances that a person will have a child under the age of 18. Here again we must

note that while regression analysis of the type presented below can establish

correlation between two variables, it cannot be used to establish causation. Because

a person either has a child or does not, the appropriate model for the regression is

again the logistic one. The data used come from the 1999 March Supplement to the

CPS and the Family Database from DMDC. The dependent variable for the model

was dependents status (1 if have dependents, 0 otherwise), and the independent

variables were the constant, age in years, sex (1 if male, 0 otherwise), income in

dollars per year, high school diploma (HSD, 1 if had a high school diploma, 0

otherwise), and civilian status (civstat, 1 if civilian, 0 otherwise). The regression

output is as follows:

ln [P/(1-P)] = -4.68 + .20 Age - .27 Sex - (2.1E-7) Income -.76 HSD - 1.02 Civstat

P-value (.0001) (.0001) (.0001) (.0001) (.0001) (.0001)

P-value for Score statistic with 5 DF =.0001

Percentage of concordant predicted probabilities and observed responses = 76.8

The coefficient on civilian status is negative and significant at well below the

1 percent level. These results suggest that even after a variety of factors are

controlled for, being in the military is associated with a higher probability of having

dependents. Each of the other variables contained in the regression is significant and

has a sign consistent with expectations. Further, the Score statistic as well as the

high percentage of concordant predicted probabilities and observed responses suggest

the model fits the data well. We estimated two other models, the Probit model and

the linear probability model, and both generated similar results. 

To gain some insight into the magnitude of the effect, we calculated the

probability of having a child under 18 that was predicted by the logistic model for a

male high school graduate, with the mean age and income, who was not in the

military. We compared that with the prediction associated with a person of the same
Figure 5: Percentage of NPS Accessions by Age, with 

Children under 18, Compared with Civilan Group, 1995-

1999

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30

Age

Percentage

Military

Civilian

Source: Based on data from the Department of Defense.

demographic characteristics who was in the military. The probability of having a

dependent estimated from the model for the person not in the military was 11

percent, whereas the probability for a person with the same characteristics who was

assumed to be in the military was 26 percent. This suggests a very strong effect, but,

again, the result should be interpreted cautiously. The actual proportion of 23-yearold military males who had a child in 1999 was approximately 36 percent, which is

higher than the probability predicted here.

Those results strongly suggest that military personnel are more likely to have

children than their civilian counterparts. As was the case for marital status, there are

at least two interpretations of that result. First, it may be the case that the military

draws people with children into service. If so, one would expect that the percentage

of accessions with children under 18 would be higher than that associated with the

civilian population. There is limited support for that view. Figure 5 displays the

percentage of accessions with children under 18 for the time period 1995-1999, as

well as that for the entire civilian population as estimated from the CPS. 

For each year after age 20, the military rate is higher than the civilian rate,

suggesting that the military draws in a higher percentage of people with children. At

the lowest end of the age spectrum, however, the civilian rate is equal to or slightly
4. In a 1991 paper titled “Does Marriage Really Make Men More Productive,” Korenman and Neumark

found that married men were more likely to be in higher paying positions than single men, and they

received higher performance ratings from their supervisors. Their research provides support for the

hypothesis that marriage does make men more productive. 

higher than the military rate. This is particularly important as the majority of NPS

accessions are under the age of 20. 

The policy implications associated with the results mentioned above depend,

in part, on how much it costs to support members with dependents, as well as how

members with dependents perform relative to those without dependents. Having

either a spouse or a child, or both, may make for more committed and responsible

soldiers. Alternatively, increased family responsibilities may make it more difficult

for soldiers to fulfill their duties. Unfortunately, research attempting to identify the

relationship between dependents status and performance has been limited. The

process is complicated by difficulties in measuring what is in practice an

unobservable variable. Several measures, including survival rates, Armed Forces

Qualification Test scores, re-enlistment rates, lost duty time, and disciplinary actions,

may provide insight into how well members with and without dependents perform,

but no measure completely and accurately captures productivity itself. Therefore, the

results discussed below must be interpreted cautiously. Although particular measures

may provide insight into a member’s productivity, the choice of measure will likely

influence the results attained. Thus, it is important to view each measure as a single

component of a larger structure.

FAMILY STATUS AND PERFORMANCE

The Civilian Sector

Some analysis suggests that married men may be more productive than single

men in the civilian economy. There is widespread agreement that married men (in

the United States as well as other industrialized countries) earn more than single men,

even when controls for age, education, race, work experience, and occupation are

introduced.4

 To the extent that wages reflect productivity, this suggests that married

men in the civilian labor market are more productive than single men. However, it
should be noted that wage differentials related to marriage may be explained in other

ways. For instance, it may be the case that employers favor married men, that certain

characteristics preferred by employers (such as responsibility and the ability to

commit) are also favored in “marriage markets,” or that men with higher wages make

more-attractive mates and are more likely to be married. Further, even if the wage

differential were entirely attributable to productivity differences, productivity in the

civilian labor market may not translate into productivity in the military. Thus, even

if marriage makes civilian men more productive, it may not have the same effect on

those in the military. 

Family Status and Performance in the Military

Existing studies of family status and performance in the military yield mixed

findings. On the one hand, a 1992 Rand study titled “Army Families and Soldier

Readiness” found that relative to single soldiers, married soldiers in the Army report

fewer job-related problems, are more committed to the Army, and expect to serve in

the Army longer. Similarly, a 1993 OASD (Personnel and Readiness) study, “Family

Status and Initial Term of Service,” reports that for the 1987 accession cohort,

married soldiers for Department of Defense (DoD) had lower attrition rates and

higher retention rates than single soldiers. Also, according to that report, married

soldiers had proportionally fewer indiscipline and substance abuse discharges. 

On the other hand, the OASD study reports that although married soldiers get

promoted to E-4 in a similar time frame as those who are single, promotion to the

more competitive enlisted grades (E-5 to E-9) typically occurs at a faster rate for

single soldiers. Further, single soldiers report having fewer problems responding to

No-Notice alerts and to No-Notice unit deployments. Finally, for the Army, Sadacca

and DiFazio (1991) found that family status was not significantly related to

individual readiness, and Pliske (1988) found that marital status was not a significant

predictor of performance on the Skill Qualification Test. 

Those results demonstrate the difficulties associated with measuring

differences in the performance of military members based on family status. While

married members may seem to be more stable than single members, single soldiers
Figure 6: Average Survival Rates by Marital Status, 1990-1994

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

12345

Years of Service

Percentage

Married

Single

Source: Based on data from the Department of Defense.

may be less encumbered by responsibilities detracting from the time and effort they

are able to put toward their work. Because of potential cost issues, more research

that systematically evaluates this issue is necessary. Of particular importance is how

long new recruits stay in the military. DoD incurs significant up-front costs to train

new recruits. The longer they stay, the higher the payoff to training. Further,

increases in expected length of service are associated with decreases in turnover

costs, and they promote unit cohesiveness and a sense of stability that benefits the

services. This highlights the importance of survival rates, which measure the length

of time a new recruit stays in the military. 

Family Status and Performance of Recruits: Survival and Continuation Rates

Differences in survival rates among groups of recruits based on family status

provide a key indicator of the merits of policies that affect the marital and dependents

status of military members. To examine this issue, we compared the survival rates

of new recruits accessing between 1990 and 1994 based on marital and dependents

status using data from the Active-Duty Master Database maintained by DMDC.

Figures 6 and 7 show the percentage of accessions in the years 1990-1994 who

remained in the military for one to five years of service.
Figure 7: Average Survival Rates by Dependents Status, 1990-1994

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

12345

Years of Service

Percentage

WIth

Without

Source: Based on data from the Department of Defense.

In comparing survival rates between married and single members, the

percentage surviving both one and two years for each of the cohorts entering between

1990 and 1994 was higher for single members. For the third year, survival rates were

similar between groups. For the fourth and fifth years, however, survival rates were

higher for married members. A similar pattern, with survival rates higher for single

members initially but higher for married members in the fifth year, is present in each

of the services except the Air Force, where survival rates were higher for married

members for each of the first five years. For dependents status, survival rates for

soldiers without children are higher for each of the cohorts listed and for each year

from one through four. However, a much greater percentage of soldiers with

dependents survive five years. Similar patterns exist for each of the services. A

comparison of “conditional” survival rates, which show the percentage of the

“surviving” cohort that makes it through each additional year rather than the

percentage of the initial cohort that survives to a particular year, yields similar

results. 

One interpretation of these results that is consistent with previous research is

that the stresses of adjusting to military life are initially felt more strongly by

members with families, but that once the initial adjustment is made they tend to be

more committed and stay longer than those without families. If true, we would

expect members with families to be less likely to complete their initial term of
Figure 8: Percentage of NPS Accessions 

Completing their First Term by Marital Status 

for Accession Cohorts, 1990-1995

52

53

54

55

56

57

58

59

90 91 92 93 94 95

Year

Percentage

Married

Single

Source: Based on data from the Department of Defense.

Figure 9: Percentage of NPS Accessions 

Completing their First Term by Dependents 

Status for Accession Cohorts, 1990-1995

48

50

52

54

56

58

60

90 91 92 93 94 95

Year

Percentage

With

Dependents

Without

Dependents

Source: Based on data from the Department of Defense.

service, but having done so they would be more likely to re-enlist. There is support

for this conjecture, as shown in Figures 8 through 11. Data for the figures come from

the Active-Duty Master Database maintained by DMDC.
Figure 10: Percentage of NPS Accessions 

Continuing Past Their First Term by Marital Status 

for Accession Cohorts, 1990-1995

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

50

90 91 92 93 94 95

Year

Percentage

Married

Single

Source: Based on data from the Department of Defense.

Figure 11: Percentage of NPS Accessions 

Continuing Past Their First Term by Dependents 

Status for Accession Cohorts, 1990-1995

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

50

90 91 92 93 94 95

Year

Percentage

With

Without

Source: Based on data from the Department of Defense.
With respect to dependents status, we see that for the cohorts entering

between 1990 and 1995 first-term survival rates were higher for members without

dependents in each year, while continuation rates were higher for those with

dependents. First-term survival rates in the Army, Navy, and Marine Corps had a

similar pattern, whereas the results for the Air Force were mixed. For continuation

rates, a similar pattern is found for the Air Force and Marine Corps, whereas the

results for the Army and Navy are mixed. 

Concerning marital status, the results are not as clear. Continuation rates

were higher for married members in each cohort (similar patterns are found by

service, with the exception of the Army, for which the results are mixed), but the

results regarding first-term survival were mixed. First-term survival rates for married

members were higher for the years from 1993 to 1995, but they were less than or

equal to those of single members for the years from 1990 to 1992. By service, firstterm survival rates were higher for single members in the Army and Marine Corps,

higher for married members in the Air Force, and the results were mixed for the

Navy. Taken as a whole, these results provide limited support for the hypothesis that

military members with families have a more difficult time adjusting early in their

careers, but once they do adjust they tend to stay in the military longer than members

without families.

CONCLUSIONS AND DIRECTIONS FOR FUTURE RESEARCH

This paper presents analysis of the family status of enlisted personnel.

Comparisons are made with relevant sections of the civilian population. Consistent

with previous research, we find that enlisted personnel are more likely to be married

and to have children than are their civilian counterparts. These differences cannot

be explained by differences between the military and civilian populations with

respect to demographic factors such as age, education, and sex. Further, most

enlisted personnel who marry and have children do so while they are in the military,

rather than entering the military with dependents. Perhaps aspects of the military

lifestyle, including policies designed to support members with dependents, are

influencing those decisions. 
The policy implications here depend on the relative performance of those

members with and without dependents as well as the costs associated with supporting

members with dependents. The analysis presented in this paper suggests that

members with families are less likely to survive the early years of service than those

without. However, if they are able to survive the first few years of service, members

with families are more likely to stay in the military past their initial term of service.