Equal Opportunity War

By Janice Castro

EVERYBODY KNOWS THAT VIETNAM WAS A CLASS WAR, WHOSE burden was borne disproportionately by the inner-city and rural poor and minorities. Well, it seems that everybody is wrong. A new study from the Massachusetts Institute of ) Technology, co-funded by the U.S. Army, shows that the 58,000 Americans who died in the war represented a good cross section of the nation. By analyzing the family income of those servicemen, the M.I.T. team found that 26% of the casualties were from families earning in the highest third of the income range, vs. 30% of casualties from the lowest third. The most prosperous servicemen, in fact, died at a slightly higher rate, mostly because they were more likely to be pilots or infantry captains and lieutenants.