This started as a little thought exercise on the bus ride home.
Beginning with the premises that conscription is just as a civic responsibility in support of the order that protects civil rights, and that all citizens enjoy equal rights, it follows that conscription must be universal and equal in order to be just. Equal sacrifice for equal rights. Call it the law of equivalent exchange, if you will. (apologies to Fullmetal Alchemist/Hagane no Renkinjutsushi)
In the real world we often diverge from this ideal form, as conscription is almost never strictly universal systemically (lotteries, male-only, exemptions, deferrals etc). But in many cases it is inclusive enough to approximate universality. How about equality then?
Most conscription systems draft citizens for specific durations – the time served by all citizens is generally equal. However, time is a tricky measure of sacrifice… An objective valuation of productivity (however quantified, opportunity cost or ‘defence value’ etc) differentials would conclude that the value of the time differs. For the same amount of time, high-productivity individuals contribute far more than low-productivity individuals, and conscription in this sense is productivity-inequitable. It is a progressive ‘tax-incidence’ on productivity, with the incentive effects that a progressive incidence causes. If productivity is endogenously determined by innate capacity and discretionary effort, disincentives to possessing high productivity would lead high capacity individuals to either opt out or reduce discretionary effort. It would be either a brain-drain or a race to the bottom, both suboptimal outcomes.
(This assumes that productivity valuation is conceptually sound – I suspect that efforts to value opportunity cost would not only have to include the market value of civilian income foregone but also the discounted returns on human capital investment foregone and other such projections of counterfactuals. If we are to ignore conventional accounting of opportunity cost for a specific value to defence efforts, then we have the pricing problem. This also assumes that valuation is practically possible – informational asymmetries are huge and the closest indicators of market value like income statements are poor proxies)
However, what if conscription was value-equitable? Instead of an equal duration of service, citizens must contribute a flat rate of X value. High productivity individuals who contribute more value thus serve a shorter period of time. Disincentives are flipped: Discretionary effort and productivity will increase. Valuation in terms of market value would help retain high capacity individuals, and raise standards all around. Valuations in terms of ‘defence’ value, depending on how prices are derived, would incentivize individuals to become better soldiers and take on greater responsibilities. In other words, there are potentially significant gains from liberalizing conscription towards a more market-based system of value-equitability.
[Edit] Just to reply to some comments on the post. Caveats – its a model of human behavior, and the model like any other model is abstracted and simplified for discursive purposes. So you’re right, there is a lot of subjectivity in value, there are multiple incentives and disincentives at work (and the net effect will differ), people aren’t hyperrational, there are other relevant concerns, the model does not explicitly factor in training time. Agreed that I’ve conflated consistency with ideals and system efficiency, two separate issues. Admittedly this wasn’t rigorously thought through – its a blog post and part of a evolving process.
I think the main point is that if differentials exist in productivity (regardless of how it is objectively derived and regardless of distinctions between ‘military’ and ‘civilian’ forms) but are not accounted for, equity is not achieved. Also, (dis)incentives come into play, and on net the system will trend towards a certain outcome.
