ABSTRACT
Times are changing—changing motivations for military service, changing expectations concerning the "terms of employment" for military service, changing aspirations toward personal dignity and "fate control," and changing the size and nature of the "manpower pool" subject to the appeals of service in the US armed forces. These changes have surfaced old and new problems. Some sources suggest that solutions lie in the formation of unions of military personnel—and they are wrong. Many people are surprised that systematic union bargaining in the United States has a very short history. Even in the private sector, collective bargaining gained the protection of federal law with the enactment of the Wagner Act. Some sources have argued that the end of military conscription and the creation of an all-volunteer force in the United States has fundamentally altered the principal motivation for people to join and remain in the armed services.
