Military Spouse Underemployment: The Elephant in the Room

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As I was reading a recent Air Force Times article on the difficulty DOD is having in tracking the success of the Military Spouse Employment Programs, I found it hard not to be a little cynical although I do appreciate that obtaining metrics on these type of programs is an incredibly difficult task. My cynicism stems from my perception that there seems to be so much emphasis on plugging a Military Spouse into a job that I think some people might be forgiven for thinking that Military Spouse employment is a charitable cause rather than a wise business decision for an employer.

There is a lot of talk about the success of Military Spouse employment programs…. “Defense officials say that since the program was launched in June 2011, more than 32,323 military spouses have been hired by MSEP employer partners”… but I do wonder how many of these spouses would have been hired regardless. I applaud the employers who are coming on board with these programs and making a public commitment to hire Military Spouses, and I think it is fantastic that DOD is trying to implement strategies to help Military Spouses - but the reality is that many of these employers (DeCA, CNIC, MCCS, Navy Exchange) were employing Military Spouses long before MSEP evolved. To evaluate the real success of the DOD Military Spouse employment initiatives, I think we need to be looking at the change in percentage of Military Spouses hired by these employers over recent years, rather than the raw number of overall jobs for spouses.

More importantly, we also need to be tracking the types of jobs which are being filled, and the appropriateness of these jobs for the educational background and professional experience of the new hire. The Military Spouse community reflects the make-up of the wider community - there are spouses from every different educational background and we all have very different career aspirations - some of us do not wish to work, and some of us want to become the President of the United States or the CEO of Lockheed Martin one day.

If we are trying to implement Military Spouse employment initiatives that are effective, we need to ensure that these programs serve their target audience and this is tough for any one program to do when the target audience is as diverse as the Military Spouse community. There are certainly some great companies which have come on board with MSEP, but I wonder if all their jobs are in Washington D.C. - I live in a major city and have a Masters degree yet the only options for my zipcode were a sales consultant for a telephone company, a bank teller and babysitting. By taking one of these jobs, I statistically appear as a success story - a Military Spouse who has located a job….but am I really?

Almost every Military Spouse I know has been underemployed at some time in the last 5 years. Many are like me - I left a mid-level management position when I married into the military, and then took a $13 dollar an hour teachers aide position in a small town after unsuccessfully trying to find a mid-level position for 2 months. I want to work and as I see the year ticking away, and the date of my next PCS approaching - I take whatever I can get. I know one of the Front Desk Staff at my local Base Childcare Center has a Masters Degree in Human Relations and the Military Spouse Professionals Forum on Linked In regularly features posts from frustrated Military Spouses who have invested an incredible amount of time and money in higher level education but are unable to find fulfilling employment commensurate with their qualifications. A recent RAND Study on Measuring Underemployment in Military Spouses found that 38% of employed Military Spouse wives are underemployed by educational mismatch compared with only 6% of a representative group of civilian wives. I think this is the elephant in the room - everyone knows it is a problem, but nobody is quite sure what to do about it so we just focus on the numbers of Military Spouses employed or hired instead.

So what can we do to address underemployment? I certainly don’t have all the answers but as Career Minded Military Spouses I think we need to start the conversation on this issue and at least throw some suggestions on the table. Here are my thoughts.

• Strategically develop some tailored Military Spouse Employment Programs which target different groups within the Military Spouse community. While an online job board may work well for entry-level positions, it may not be as appropriate for some of the middle management and executive level positions that many Military Spouses target. Perhaps a Military Spouse Grad and Post Grad Employment Program could utilize Recruiters who worked individual Military Spouse cases in specific locations and could liaise directly between companies representatives and a Military Spouse who had just received orders.

• Expand the resources and staffing of the Family Employment Readiness Program run through the ACS, FFSC and Airman and Family Readiness Centers in order to empower them to network and advocate directly with the Local Defense Contracting Companies and Local Civilian Employers at the grass roots level, rather than just providing employment counseling and advice.

• Designate a portion of Base Federal and MWR positions at all levels as Designated Military Spouse positions in a similar way to the arrangement that overseas Bases use to advertise positions for Local Military Spouse applicants only.

• Support professional development for all Military Spouses, regardless of educational level or Service Member’s rank. MYCAA is a classic example of program which initially offered a great opportunity for career minded Military Spouses to advance and refine their professional qualifications, but has been scaled back to support basic qualifications for typical entry level positions.

Underemployment of Military Spouses is a difficult but important issue to address as it affects the morale and quality of life of the Military Spouse and their family. Recurrent underemployment of the Military Spouse can become a significant deterrent to the long term retention of the Service Member. As a nation I believe that we also have a moral obligation to ensure that we are setting up our Military Families, who have sacrificed so much, for success. Many Military Spouses may need or want to become the primary breadwinner following the Service Member’s separation or retirement from service. We must also recognize that some Military Spouses may find themselves as the sole income earner after a death, injury or separation from their partner. A track record of underemployment does not set our Military Families up for long term satisfaction or financial stability.