I saw a slide recently from PERS-41 showing a 35 year history of SWO accessions versus retention. Don't quote me, but I recall the historical retention average being around 33% or so. Also, don't quote me on the below - it was very intersting and I think my memory is accurate:
The accession graph was fascinating as you could clearly see how the pol-mil environment shaped the force. Things looked a little depressing in the mid-70's and early 80's. Reagan's tenure saw a huge spike in accessions in '85 and '86. Accessions in the early 90's went way low and account for the 35 year low numbers. Then the numbers came back up in the late-90s and early '00s. There was a dip in the '03-'04 timeframe and a jump this year.
On the retention, the worst numbers (low 20 percent) were in the early 90's. Interstingly, this corresponds to point when the high accessions from '85 and '86 were making their decision to stay or get out. Basically, from YG84 to YG92, retention was terrible! Starting with YG93 and clearly jumping with YG95, retention jumped back to the low to mid 30 percents.
I also recently saw an aviation snapshot of one year (I think it was 2009) showing around a 48% retention between 7 and 12 YCS. I really couldn't get my arms around the number since it somehow captured all YGs between 7 and 12 YCS. I suspect retention for aviators is still in the mid to high 40s past 12 YCS. I think aviation retention is higher since Aviators have longer paybacks pushing them closer to the 20 YCS mark. A SWO LT at the 5 YCS point can have a drastically different outlook on things compared to an aviator LCDR at the 11-12 YCS mark.
I also know the SWO manning model specifically accounts for a certain number of SWO option and lat/xfers to the RL and Staff Corps. Since many of those communities don't direct access, they rely on transfers from SWO/SUB and attrites from Aviation. If they those RL and Staff Community Managers want a programed influx, SWO accessions is the way to go by simply accounting for larger numbers out due to options and lat/xfers. You can't plus up aviation or subs - it's a non-starter.
So, surface ships will be busting at the seams with Ensigns for a couple of years. According to that graph I recall, we went through this in other spikes including '86, '99, '00 and here in '10.
