The U.S.'s all-volunteer military dates back to 1973. And in all that time all four services have never at the same time met their recruiting goals. Until now.

Uncle Sam recruiting poster.

The U.S. military's services have all hit their recruiting goals for the first time in the 36 year history of the all-volunteer army.

NPR's J.J. Sutherland reported the following for the network's newscast:

The numbers were up across the board in all four services. And quality was up too. Ninety six percent of all recruits this year had a high school diploma, almost 75 percent scored above the 50th percentile on the Armed forces aptitude tests and the number of waivers given, whether for criminal history, or for medical conditions, are down.

Defense Department officials attribute the increase to two factors —better recruiting — but more than that, a poor economy. For every one percent increase in unemployment, they say, there's a half a percent more recruits.

The recruiting was so good this year that the Army already has about 40 percent of next year's recruits, about 30,000, already in the pipeline for training camp.

As a result, the Defense Department is cutting hundreds of millions of dollars from next year's recruiting budget.

 

So Uncle Sam probably doesn't want you if you have a criminal record or lack a high school diploma. Because of the economy, it now can get enough recruits without bending its standards as it did several years ago when a good economy and Iraq War concerns left the services scrambling for recruits.