Soft Economy Aids Army Recruiting Effort (NYT): The slumping American economy has proved to be a boon to the Army’s efforts to recruit the 100,000 enlisted soldiers it says it needs this year to fill its active-duty and reserve ranks, senior Army officials say, so far relieving concerns that the turmoil in Iraq could crimp new enlistments.... The Army has raised signing bonuses to as much as $20,000 for badly needed positions like intelligence analysts. It has also increased college aid. And it has nearly doubled its advertising budget... It has ramped up a cyberrecruiting operation, with daily online chat rooms in English and Spanish. Next month it is rolling out a 15-month enlistment option (the current minimum length for a tour is two years) aimed at college students, an increasingly important target group. The sagging economy mostly affects the recruiting of active-duty soldiers. About two-thirds of all enlisted troops resign by the end of their first tour, so the Army needs more than 70,000 new recruits a year to replenish its ranks.... Sign-up bonuses for jobs in high demand, like intelligence analysts and helicopter mechanics, are now as high as $20,000, up from $15,000 a few years ago. (Bonuses for most Reserve troops range up to $5,000.) The Army will now pay up to $50,000 in education expenses and repay up to $65,000 in student loans, both sharp increases over past years.
The French Fry Bust (USA Today): “Sales have plummeted so far so fast — 5% at wholesale and at least 10% at retail over the past year — that potato processors are desperately trying to invent an image campaign to bolster sales. Fries account for as much as $20 billion of the fast foodies’ $105 billion annual sales, experts estimate. McDonald’s, Burger King and Wendy’s, all watching fry sales decline, helped bring this upon themselves — and the food industry. With entrée salad sales rocketing and burger sales dropping, french fry sales have hit the skids. “For every burger not sold, there’s a bag of fries not sold,” says Harry Balzer, who oversaw NPD’s study. If the trend continues, it could change the restaurant world, and what comes out of the kitchens of the major potato processors. As the most popular side dish, “There is not even a close second” to french fries, says Dennis Lombardi, senior vice president at Technomic, a restaurant consulting firm. But something has to replace them, and potato processors are working overtime to see that it’s made from potatoes. Tests include baked wedges. “This is tough to take after a 50-year growth curve,” says Tim O’Connor, CEO of the U.S. Potato Board. “When you have a business fall off 5%, it gets your attention.”
The Economics of Bushmeat (A. Summers, LRC): By creating wildlife preserves, government takes the value out of natural resources and creates a tragedy-of-the-commons problem that inevitably leads to scarcity (extinction) and lost economic opportunity in a section of the world that desperately needs economic development.
