My oldest just recently joined and his recruiter said the biggest barrier they face right now is potential recruits not wanting to get the COVID vaccine. It's also much harder to find people now that can make both the mental and physical requirements, and when they have to get waivers or additional evaluations it takes FOREVER. My youngest is still waiting on psych eval results 3 months later from the Dallas MEPs.

Young people don't really want to join because they know the military has deeply dysfunctional institutional problems, the ones that do want to join face uphill battles to qualify, and even among the ones that are qualified, they don't want to get vaccinated thanks to GOP propaganda and disinformation.

It's a shitshow and so far their only solution is just throwing huge bonuses at people.