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I’m not opposed to a mandatory community service year upon turning 18, where a person who is physically and mentally able is required to spend 12 months PAID to work in a government organized community service program. This can help new adults gain new skills, create contacts, get references, and get off on the right foot financially.
But “military” is definitely not the right direction. IMO
The problem is that just discriminates against lower and middle class people more than anything.
It is work experience that has no meaningful value for a career (especially if EVERYONE has it) that mostly just serves to delay when people start college/trade school/whatever. Which hurts their ability to "hit the ground running" because they need to relearn what little they retained from high school but also impacts lifelong learning rather significantly. Whereas anyone who can pay off a doctor to say they have flat feet or some other non "yucky" issue will skip it.
And also? It is more or less worthless for the military. For anything short of cannon fodder, a year is nowhere near enough time to train someone to be useful. Even room clearing (e.g. Rangers) needs significantly more training to be less likely to shoot friendlies than foes. A lot of the problems in the Ukraine war (on both sides, honestly) can be traced to this. A soldier who can do more than "hold the line" needs significant training.
And while I think a return to having a strong emphasis on civil engineering and infrastructure as public service would be a great idea... without an education that is basically just hard physical labor. So now we have even more kids starting with debilitating injuries before they even begin their "real" career.
And your point, even Medics who have served in combat roles and saved lives on the front line can't even become civilian paramedics without four additional years of college after they're done in the military. This is all because nobody's figured out how to transfer the training that they received in the military over to the civilian world certifications
That is actually an interesting discussion for different reasons, but yeah. But less life threatening stuff (like being a mechanic) transfers a lot faster but also gets into the mess of "why is the army spending all this money to train people who are leaving in June?" and why contracts tend to be for multiple years (chatgpt says 8) with the option to stoploss people until the end of time.
But yeah. Between family and climbing/mountaineering buddies I have had a weirdly large number of conversations with paramedics and various rescue folk.
The big issue there, aside from liability, is that militaries tend to mostly be focused on catastrophic injuries and the idea that you just throw a tourniquet on someone and deal with it later. Cynically speaking, because they are already going to be injured enough from those gunshots that they aren't likely to ever return to active duty so it doesn't really matter if they lose a limb.
Whereas paramedics and people doing wilderness rescue ARE increasingly having to deal with catastrophic injuries from gunfire on the regular but are still trained to use tourniquets as a last resort. Because... if you apply a tourniquet correctly you are basically guaranteeing at least long term nerve damage if not losing the limb itself. Its why the idiots who keep tourniquets in their truck (because 'murica) often do more harm than good if they actually know how to use them.
But the good news is that the militaries of the world have increasingly discovered the magic that is hemostatic bandages (e.g. quick clot) with a lot of rank and file troops basically being taught to just shove that anywhere they see a wound and to jam it into the cavity of a gunshot. Yes, there can be complications, but it is about as safe as it gets and it has very comparable statistics to most situations where a tourniquet would be used with significantly less risk of long term injuries from the treatment.
Which is why it is increasingly suggested to pack a few of those in your wilderness first aid kit or even your "I live in America and have good odds of getting shot at the Kroger" kit in your car. Tourniquets are a last resort deal. Hemostatic gauze is a "yolo, just make sure you have gloves on when you pack it in there".
DISCLAIMER: I am obviously exaggerating a bit and please actually understand whatever medical supplies you keep with you or are likely to be exposed to (i.e. What your friends carry)