Legislative Proposals to Establish Professional Acquisition Corps

GAO discussed a legislative proposal to create a professional acquisition work force and corps within each military service. GAO noted that: (1) it supported the goal of developing a professional acquisition work force; (2) it had previously identified desirable characteristics of such a work force, including early entry into the profession, intensive training, a career path with incentives, and tenure; (3) proposals to implement locality and merit pay should be applied to the entire federal work force, rather than just to acquisition personnel; and (4) while a centralized effort to train acquisition professionals would be desirable, the scope and mission of such activities should be carefully defined.