The United States has seen a record high of Asian Americans and people from other ethnic groups getting recruited in the army, according to a study published on Wednesday.

This can be attributed to rising unemployment rate in the country during recession and the increased bonuses provided by the U.S. government, said researchers at RAND Corp., a non-profit think tank.

In Los Angeles County last year, 22 percent of Army recruits were Asian-Americans, which is almost twice their proportion in the population. In the San Francisco Bay Area, the sign-up rate is also spiking. The proportion of newly enlisted soldiers who are Asian- Americans this year is nearly double that of last year, statistics show.

Usually Asian Americans were most unlikely to join the army and those who volunteered to join the army have the lowest rate of any ethnic groups. Asians make up 4 percent of the U.S. population, but only 1 percent of military recruits, statistics show.

For the first time that began to change. California sees a most remarkable increase of Army recruits. Similar increases have been reported from Seattle, New York and other cities.

One of the reasons behind the increase is that most Asian American parents want their children to "go to college", and joining the army is one way to go to college since the U.S. Government will pay the four-year tuition for anyone who has served in the army and will go to college.

The U.S. Army has expanded its college program to pay for anyone to go to any college all across California like University of California Los Angeles, (UCLA), University of California Berkeley, California state universities. Since the government will pay for their four-year tuition so they can get a degree and then pursue their chosen field, which is very attractive.

According to Mark Howell, Chief, Advertising & Public Affairs at US Army, the U.S. Army is not necessarily strengthening its recruitment of Asian Americans but the reason for the event was to educate any misperceptions Asian Americans have about joining the military.

Howell said a lot of people, especially Asian Americans and the Asian Pacific Islander community think that once a person signs up they go to war. But that's not the case. The U.S. Army has over 150 jobs available in the medical field, high tech jobs like computers, a lot of different things they can do in the military.

According to the U.S. Census, there are less than 300,000 Asian Americans serving in the U.S. military. Targeting Asian Americans who want their children to receive better education, the U.S. Army provides an alternative path with the U.S. economy in deep recession and the higher tuition has caused a heavy burden for them.

Army officials said the US Army offers education, bonuses and trainings in over 150 job programs and career disciplines. It provides excellent benefits, including salary, health care, retirement pay, childcare, food and housing.

Another incentive is the citizenship Expedited Program. Those who have permanent status (green cards) do not have to wait for five years to get their U.S. citizenship. Once they join the army, they can apply for U.S. citizenship and get approved very soon.

Barry Huang, a Chinese American, told the press that he would do what his parents want him to do, which is to go to college, get an education.

"Now that the economy has gone down and the tuition's gone up - the Army, they can pay for my college, so I was like, might as well do it," Barry said.

Another factor that encourages Asian Americans to join the army is that both in Iraq and Afghanistan, American soldiers are not fighting against Asians like in World War II or in Vietnam.

A new study by the RAND Corporation, a well-known think tank in Los Angeles, said that the increased use of cash bonuses by the U.S. Department of Defense to encourage military enlistment and reenlistment had a positive effect on recruiting and retention in the armed forces.

According to the study, until recently, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have placed greater stress on military recruitment and retention. Recruit quality-defined as the percent of recruits who have earned a high school diploma and who score in the top half of the Armed Forces Qualification Test-fell between 2003 and 2008. In addition, the four service branches, particularly the Army, struggled to meet recruiting goals.

The U.S. Department of Defense budget for enlistment and reenlistment bonuses increased sharply from 2000 to 2008, more than doubling to 625 million dollars for enlistment bonuses and rising more than 50 percent to 1.4 billion dollars for selective reenlistment bonuses, the study said.

"Enlistment bonuses were an important contributor to the Army's success in meeting its recruiting objectives in recent years," said Beth Asch, the study's lead author and a senior economist at RAND, a nonprofit research organization.

"Using models we developed, we estimate that high-quality Army enlistments would have been 20 percent lower between 2004 and 2008 in the absence of the increase in enlistment bonuses," the study said.

Asch and her colleagues also estimate that reenlistment bonuses helped improve the rate of people who extended their commitment to the Army after their first term ended. The effects of reenlistment bonuses for the other services varied. The impact was positive for both the Navy and Marine Corps, but not as helpful for the Air Force.

The study found that the size and scope of enlistment bonuses increased in the Army between 2004 and 2008. The average Army enlistment bonus increased from 5,600 dollars to about 18,000 dollars per soldier over that period, with the amount of the increase varying by occupational specialty.

This suggests that the Army used enlistment bonuses to both expand the market for recruits and to channel them into specific job skills, according to the study.

Navy enlistment bonuses increased too, but not to the same extent as the Army, the study said.

In the case of reenlistment bonuses, the branches with the heaviest combat duties in Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom had the largest increases in bonus use and generosity. For example, almost 80 percent of soldiers reenlisting at the end of their first term in the Army and Marine Corps received a bonus during 2007.

The study also found that enlistment bonus programs were relatively more cost-effective for the Army than regular military compensation-defined as basic pay, the allowances for housing and subsistence, and the tax advantages associated with getting these allowances tax-free.

But in the Army, the study found that recruiters tend to be slightly more cost-effective. The study estimates that the additional cost per recruit for enlistment bonuses is 44,000 dollars, increasing base pay is 57,600 dollars and adding an Army recruiter costs 33,200 dollars.

In the case of reenlistment bonuses, the study found a range of estimates based on varying assumptions. The cost of an additional person-year of service at the first reenlistment point is 24,900 dollars for the Army, 28,000 dollars for the Navy, 17,000 dollars for the Marine Corps and 70,000 dollars for the Air Force.

The study found that bonuses were generally cost-effective in improving enlistments and reenlistments relative to pay.