The option which became available on March 25 had drawn 148 enlistments through April 6. The Army is studying the possibility of offering civilians the opportunity to sign up for combat arms duty in Panama and Hawaii and other areas of the world. The USAREUR option guarantees the young enlistee a minimum of 16 months duty in Europe. The option allows him to select a specific unit from among seven major units if he wants. Another option approved for April 15 gives young men the opportunity to sign up specifically for CONUS or oversea duty with the Army Strategic Communications Command (STRATCOM). This option gives a young man the opportunity to select either MOS school he wishes to attend or his initial duty assignment. Those who select their MOS school will have their initial duty assignment picked by STRATCOM. The agency will select the school of those and their initial STRATCOM duty assignment. Mr. STEIGER. You know, one of the things that is going along with the ad campaign is the effort to take men in the service and put them into their hometowns and make them available to high schools and make them available to kids who are about to graduate from high school. So you can talk about the a dcampaign, the visit to the recruiter, and then the ability of hometown servicemen to sit down with high school students and go into the campaign with them and to suggest why it makes sense to come into the Army. Mr. VAN DEERLIN. Mr. Tiernan? Mr. TIERNAN. Thank you. I want to welcome my colleague, Mr. Steiger, to the committee and I appreciate your testimony. On page 4, when you say, "Second, a precedent for Government purchase" of radio space exists in terms of the purchasing of print advertising in different magazines and whatnot, I personally find a little bit of difference here. You see, the newspapers and magazines I don't believe ever offered free advertising space to the Army or any military branch, or the Government as a whole. They might undertake some advertising for Smokey the Bear or something like that, but not in the area of military procurement, whereas in the area of radio and television this has always been an available item as a public service announcement, and it is certainly in the public interest that we have an allvolunteer Army. It would seem to me that the Army certainly should have exhausted the possibilities of obtaining an intensified program through the Advertising Council, but no effort was made, no tests were run on the effectiveness of its previous campaign in the public service area. In fact, the results, from the testimony we have had from the gentlemen from the Army, indicated the Army did just about as well as the Marine Corps in obtaining free time on public service announcements, and yet their commitment is probably, you know, 20 or 30 times as much as the Marine Corps'. I find, first of all, that the Army, and you in your own statement indicate that for the period from 1965 to 1968 they made no increase in the budget to obtain a volunteer Army, no increase in their recruiting strength. I think the steps they have undertaken in increasing recruiters from approximately 3.000 to 6.000 and the opening of new recruiting stations and things like that are fine. But I don't feel they should have gone and spent this money in the area of broadcasting when it was available to them, and it may have been that the Advertising Council would have turned it down, but they didn't try to obtain this. Mr. STEIGER. May I say to the gentleman that I really don't concur, and the reason is this. The Advertising Council president, in his testimony that preceded mine, indicated that by and large, in most of their campaigns for Smokey the Bear, they have historically been able to put most of this on in the summertime, but I really don't think the Advertising Council and the networks would have been able to arrange a schedule to enable them to have their prime time advertising take place in the Milwaukee Bucks-Baltimore Bullets playoff, or the national league hockey or baseball or football, or the kinds of prime time programs, plus all of the ones during the regular week programs that the Army selected and its agency has selected in order to target in on the specific population. So I frankly don't think that the Advertising Council approach would have been a satisfactory means of attempting to provide the kind of effect that this campaign has been tending to provide. You know, you are right about the fact the Army did not do much in 1965 to 1968, they have not historically done it and have not had to. But they do now, and one of the things I want to make sure we don't do is cut them off. Mr. TIERNAN. First of all, let me indicate the testimony under way for the 13-weeks test period, measured by that, if it only reaches 50 percent of what they are shooting for, do you think they might increase the budget allowance for the television campaign? Mr. STEIGER. I am not sure we would have to even talk about 50 percent having been reached in order to justify increase or decrease, because I think one of the things you will find, if we give them time to do it, is that the 13 weeks you will find at the end of 26 weeks an increase in fact was a decrease, that you had the kind of cumulative effect I think the advertising campaign is designed for, and it is that kind of thing I want to be sure we have. Mr. TIERNAN. Suppose it does not quite meet what they set as a goal, what do we do then? Mr. STEIGER. Well, without knowing necessarily what the goal is, I am not sure they have defined their goal, and I don't know the goal in terms of, you know, how many people they are looking for. I think you are going to have to begin to assess how much was spent. what kind of a response, how many people actually signed up, and then you will be able to make a judgment about whether or not it made sense in terms of the expenditure of funds or whether you could have spent it better on barracks or quarters, bonuses, or, you know, some other means to do the same kind of thing. Mr. TIERNAN. Well, you know, there has been quoted to us the statement of the chairman of the Armed Services Committee. Mr. Hébert; he wished any of the money spent on the campaign not to be spent on CBS, in view of their program "Selling of the Pentagon." Do you have any comment as to possibilities of pressure if this expenditure is allowed: do you think there is any fear of pressure here at all, or influence? Mr. STEIGER. No. Mr. TIERNAN. None at all? Mr. STEIGER. The classic being Life magazine, and the fact that the Army bought an ad that ran in the same issue as the exposé on the Mylai incident; and I don't think the ad influenced any of the print media, and I don't see it influencing the visual media. Mr. TIERNAN (presiding). Thank you very much. Mr. STEIGER. Thank you very much. Mr. TIERNAN. Mr. Norman Cash, president of the Television Advertising Bureau. I want to welcome you here before the committee, although it has shrunk here considerably. I apologize, because this is a busy time of the year for all of the members, and we have all of the different labor groups in, and I have 40 students waiting to see me as soon as we conclude here. STATEMENT OF NORMAN E. CASH, PRESIDENT, THE TELEVISION BUREAU OF ADVERTISING, INC. Mr. CASH. The Television Bureau of Advertising (TvB) is a trade association serving advertisers and advertising agencies in areas of promotion, research, and sales. TvB is supported financially by statioins, networks, station representatives, and program producers. TvB respectfully presents its views to help members of the Subcommittee on Communications and Power to evaluate the use of television as a paid advertising medium for departments of Federal, State, and local governments. The television industry recognizes and has demonstrated its public service responsibilities. According to the Advertising Council, whose figures are most conservative, free time and space is being given to agencies of government at all levels including charitable, religious, and educational institutions, too numerous to mention, in excess of $450 million a year. Television has consistently given the largest share of this dollar value of any of the measured media. The television stations, we are assured, will continue to more than fulfill their role in the public interest, convenience, and necessity. We firmly believe that it is wrong to preclude from government departments and agencies the use of television on a paid basis for the carriage of advertisements for the following reasons: Television is indisputably the most effective communications medium today. The interest on the part of the citizens of the United States in television is currently recorded by viewing levels just short of 7 hours a day in 95 percent of the American homes. Television is the number one choice of the national advertiser and has been for 16 years. Of those 30 years of age or younger, representing 53 percent of the population, television is their first media choice. It is this very impact of television and the number of social problems it is being asked to help solve that call for a marketing approach to using this medium, an approach including paid advertising. The alternative of public service messages alone finds each message competing for air time against all other such messages, the final decision being made by individual station licensees, based upon their individual concepts of their market's needs. Public service messages are aired based upon the telecaster's judgment which may or may not correspond with the wishes of the message's source. Through the marketing approach of paid advertising, each market is selected, the on-air weight is determined, and even the choice of message remains within the control of the message's sponsor. This enables the advertiser to obtain the type of audience, the size of audience, and the television impact he wishes, a technique advertisers have found most efficient for moving products. If a message is denied the ability to pay for its television time, it has been denied the right to control its own future and must hope it can eventually reach those it feels need reaching. As a paid advertiser, the message has an opportunity to use the marketing skills for its own control of its own future. Research conducted by TvB in recent years strongly indicates that people are turning to government for solutions to all of society's problems and in ever increasing numbers. Government officials have attested to the fact that government cannot do this job alone. It is the conviction of the TvB, therefore, that the Government should encourage the private sector, business, religion, education, and unions, to shoulder a larger responsibility in solving these problems. A direct incentive to encourage the private sector through tax reduction, award, or other form of recognition should be instituted. It would be a tragic waste to disqualify government and its agencies from the use of this powerful medium on a paid basis. The Advertising Council and others (104 sources of drug commercials) have furnished television stations with advertisements addressed to the narcotics and dangerous drug problem in behalf of the Departments of Health, Education, and Welfare, Justice. and Defense. Their covering letter points out drugs as the number one problem. They attest to the positive effects of television advertising. How much faster this problem could be solved if government were to act as an advertiser directly and exert the necessary weight in behalf of this and other issues! The advertising demands of Railpax, the postal system, military recruitment, and the narcotics and dangerous drug problem, need professional marketing skills. Properly executed, literally millions of dollars can be saved and solutions expedited. Other governments have recognized this through programs involving tourism, the changes in the monteary system, and food and power programs. The television communications medium, with credit to the Federal Communications Commission, has been developed by the private sector without Government subsidy. Because of its effectiveness to carry advertisements, it has produced gross revenues of $15,455,300,000 since 1950 (source: FCC). As a national advertising medium, it is indisputably No. 1 as a choice of dollar expenditures by the national advertiser. The expenses to maintain this broadcast system 1950-69 was in excess of $11 billion. It is estimated that the taxes paid to the Federal Government alone are in excess of $2,300 million (source: FCC). Despite this record, since 1950, 20 percent of the stations have gone off the air. According to the FCC figures for 1969, 28 percent of the stations reported a loss, 50 percent reported income before taxes of under $1 million, and 22 percent of the stations reported before-tax income of over $1 million. Television stations will continue to voluntarily support Government requests. Demands for time are increasing. To insure proper exposure to vital issues, TvB recommends that Government agencies continue to have the right to use the media on a paid basis. It is further recommended that Government propose to the private sector through tax incenitve, or other awards, that they be encouraged to shoulder responsibilities with Government in the communication process of common societal needs. (TvB membership list follows:) TVB MEMBERS Maryland Baltimore-WBAL-TV, WJZ-TV, WMAR TV Hagerstown-WHAG-TV Massachusetts Adems-WCDC Boston - WBZ TV, WHDH-TV, WKBG-TV, WNAC-TV, WSBK.TV New Bedford - WTEV Springfold-WWLP Michigan Cadillac-WWTV Detroit-WJBK.TV, WKBD-TV, Flint-Bay City Saginaw-WJET.TV, WNEM-TV Grand Rapids - WOOD-TV Lansing-Jockson-WILX TV, WJIM-TV Minnesota Alexandria-KCMT-TV Austin KAUS TV Duluth Superior-KDAL-TV Minneapolis-KMSP TV, WCCO.TV St. Paul-KSTP.TV Mississippi Biloxi WLOX.TV Hettiesburg Laurel-WDAM-TV Missouri Columbia-KOMU-TV Jeplin- KODE.TV Kansas City KCMO-TV, KMBC-TV, WDAF-TV St. Louis-KPLR-TV, KMOX-TV, KSD-TV Montana Kalispell-KCFW TV Missula-KGVO.TV Nebraska Lincoln-KOLN.TV Omahe --KETV, KMTV, WOW.TV Las Vegas-KLAS-TV, KORK-TV New Mexico Albuquerque-KOAT-TY, KOB-TV New York Binghamton WINE.TV, WNB.TV WNBC-TV, WNEW-TV, WOR-TV, Rochester- WHEC TV, WOKE TV, WROC-TV Schenectady - WRGB Syrecuse-WHEN-TV Utica-WUTR TV North Carolina North Dakota Ohio Ab on WAKE.TV Conten-WJAN.TV Cincinnati-WCPO.TV, WKRC-TV, WLWT-TV, WXDX-TV Cleveland - WJW TV, WKBF.TV, WKYC.TV Youngstown-WYTV Zanesville-WHIZ-TV Oklahoma Oklahoma City-KOCO-TV, KWTV, WKY-TV Oregon Coos Bay-KCBY.TV Klamath Falls-KOTI-TV La Grande- KTVR Pennsylvania Alteana-WFBG TY Lancaster Lebanon-WGALTV, WITH TV WTAE-TY Scranton Wilkes Barre-WNEP TV Wyoming ABC Television Stations Cowles Magazines & Broadcasting, Inc. Doubleday Broadcasting Co. Fetzer Broodcosting Company Gilmore Broadcasting Group Hildreth Stations |