The ‘Shrinking’ Defense Industrial Base
of those contractors, making this the final sample selected to receive survey invitations.
TABLE 1. SAMPLE FRAME
Presumed Exits
Presumed Exits w/ POC
Unique Contractors
Fiscal Year
(Count)
(Percentage)
(Count)
(Percentage)
2015
67,768
12,057
17.8%
3,868
32.1%
2016
65,669
11,790
18.0%
4,266
36.2%
2017
63,548
11,885
18.7%
5,010
42.2%
2018
60,502
11,660
19.3%
5,962
51.1%
2019
57,154
11,530
20.2%
7,053
61.2%
2020
53,866
11,083
20.6%
8,341
75.3%
2021
52,018
13,170
25.3%
10,797
82.0%
2022
48,476
--
--
--
--
Total
401,233
83,175
20.7%
45,297
54.5%
Note. POC = Point of Contact.
Survey The George Mason University Institutional Review Board approved the survey content and distribution, and the authors followed all applicable research protocols to protect human subjects’ privacy. For example, at the outset, the authors informed participants of the purpose of the survey, the expected time for completion, and contact details of the research team to field any potential questions or concerns. Participants also received assurance that all responses would remain confidential and that only aggregated results would be reported. The authors chose Qualtrics to conduct the survey from May 30, 2023, to June 25, 2023, with a median completion time of 4 minutes and 12 seconds. Each survey recipient received a customized email text invitation and first survey page, including the contractor’s name, Data Universal Numbering System (DUNS) number (another unique identifier used prior to UEI), and presumed fiscal year of exit. Respondents were first required to confirm that the referenced contractor had in fact exited the DIB; those who answered negatively to this question were thanked for their willingness to participate and exited early from the survey. The survey then directed respondents who confirmed that the contractor had indeed left the DIB to two demographic questions about the contractor (net revenue and full-time employee count), followed by a question about the primary reason why the contractor no longer held a prime contract with DoD. Two answer choices from
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Defense ARJ, Summer 2025, Vol. 32 No. 2: 194—223
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