[HN Gopher] The United States Digital Corps
___________________________________________________________________
The United States Digital Corps
Author : tomrod
Score : 247 points
Date : 2022-04-08 16:04 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (digitalcorps.gsa.gov)
(TXT) w3m dump (digitalcorps.gsa.gov)
| RosanaAnaDana wrote:
| The GS rates for all federal services are so laughably bad its a
| bit disgusting.
|
| Afaik, they're still expecting people with 4 year science degrees
| (BS) to start at ~16$hr
| Victerius wrote:
| Good luck convincing 70 year old congressmen that 22 year old
| software engineers working for the government should be paid as
| much, if not more, than them.
|
| Government needs a pay raise across the board. The president
| should earn $10 million per annum. Senators, $2,000,000.00.
| Representatives, $1,200,000.00. Government employees, an
| average of $175,000.00. And entry level software engineers for
| the government, $200,000.00.
| RosanaAnaDana wrote:
| I got a BS in botany thinking I wanted to work for the Park
| Service, Forest Service, BLM, something like that.
|
| Not only was entry level a paupers wage, and strictly
| seasonal, but there was no clear way to get into a career
| tract position. I ended up going into industry and making 2x,
| and within 3 years was making 3x.
|
| I would much rather be out in the world counting plants, but
| I would have never been able to buy a home, or get ahead in
| any reasonable fashion had I continued that path.
| lastofthemojito wrote:
| It's not necessarily bad everywhere and for everyone - I think
| park rangers in East Nowheresville do ok. There's a base GS pay
| scale and then locality adjustments for different metro areas,
| and the big problem with the WASHINGTON-BALTIMORE-ARLINGTON,
| DC-MD-VA-WV-PA locality is right there in the name: WV-PA. They
| pretend that folks working in downtown DC ought to be paid the
| same as folks at some remote site in WV. So yeah, I believe
| that means a 31% adjustment compared to the base GS pay scale,
| when to be competitive with other DC area salaries, the
| adjustment probably needs to be more like 80%.
| stonogo wrote:
| I know many, many people who commute daily from Pennsylvania
| and West Virginia to DC. York and Harper's Ferry are short
| commutes. I know more than one Bucks County resident who make
| the trip.
| navbaker wrote:
| There is no world where I would call York, PA to DC a
| "short commute".
| fullstop wrote:
| If I remember correctly, they will greatly assist in student
| loan repayment.
| wmeredith wrote:
| The PSLF program will forgive government-backed student loans
| after 120 payments made while working for a government
| entity.
|
| PSLF website: https://studentaid.gov/manage-
| loans/forgiveness-cancellation...
| emilfihlman wrote:
| On top of the page there's a: "Official website of the USA,
| here's how you know", and they list "it's on a .gov domain and
| uses https.
|
| Well, is that really so? I doubt it.
| supernova87a wrote:
| I sincerely hope that this government office has an associated
| division (or function) that is not just responsible for
| developing/procuring/scoping the detailed technology solutions
| but also responsible for:
|
| -- Removing the incentives / disincentives for agencies to stick
| with old technology or processes (for legitimate, or even stupid
| reasons)
|
| -- Coming up with ways to motivate/enable government workers and
| leaders to want new technology tools and break out of resistance
| based on existing methods
|
| -- Advocate for budgets to properly fund the development of such
| tech initiatives rather than a) ignore the growing problem, or b)
| prefer to fund the old outdated methods
|
| -- Inform the policymakers why all of the above are important,
| and why (as appropriate) it is more cost-effective and real-
| outcome-beneficial in the long run
|
| Because I think what you'll find is that it is rarely the tech
| that is the bottleneck constraint. Put a good tool in front of
| anyone as an individual and unless they're stupid, they'll
| generally want to do it. Put it in front of them as a worker who
| has other constraints and interests in the system created to
| date, and they display many other behaviors.
|
| When you have a tool / method that is shown to be 10x greater in
| benefit, of course governments will start to adopt it. It's
| beyond objectionable when they see something that good. And
| citizens will put up with some temporary inconvenience to switch
| because it's nonsensical to stick to such blatantly inferior
| methods.
|
| But when some new solution is only 1.5x better, then you get a
| lot of resistance (sometimes legitimate) that people need to be
| able to rely on their existing solutions or it costs too much to
| change, etc, etc. And you start losing out on significant, but
| insufficiently better, efficient solutions that are needed to
| keep us out of lagging place in the world.
| andreisbc wrote:
| You're right but never forget how the world, systems and people
| work. Even if you're an absolute rationalist, these ideas will
| keep flying in the realm of abstract. In the real world,
| idealists are starving. Cheers for your thought exercise, but
| real life will prove you that you're wasting breath. Just enjoy
| giaour wrote:
| I think USDS had stickers with "it is rarely the tech that is
| the bottleneck constraint" or something like that printed on
| them. I still have one that echoes your fourth point on a
| laptop. :)
|
| Those areas are honestly what USDS employees spend most of
| their time and energy working on.
| wslack wrote:
| I work at a related office mentioned in this thread (but am
| posting personally here):
|
| You're 100% right about all of these, and I would emphasize
| that *the tech is not the hard part.* I would challenge you a
| little bit about something 10x greater being "beyond
| objectionable" - a benefit to users may not align with the
| incentives you named. For example, there's public evidence that
| some state governments deliberately made benefits harder to
| access to help even their budgets.
| IanDrake wrote:
| lacoolj wrote:
| anyone know specifics on what they do? the page isn't very clear
| noasaservice wrote:
| I've tried to apply to federal positions for years. I won't even
| get so much as a "fuck off".
|
| However when I apply to commercial, I'm snapped up in weeks. The
| most recent move was to a contractor. Again, 2 weeks to hire. 3
| interviews total 2h. I have no degree, but my work expertise
| speaks for itself. Commercial sees that. The feds dont seem to
| care.
|
| It is with a contractor for the federal govt. $150k/yr. Generous
| benefits. But being a contractor, it is without federal
| protections, without school debt forgiveness, and others.
|
| Whatever. I prefer to stay for the length of the project. In this
| case, it's 2-3y. Would I work for the feds again? Absolutely.
| Will I even get a response when applying? Hardly.
| erdos4d wrote:
| Every person I have ever met who worked for the feds has had an
| attitude that govt. employees are THE BEST WHO EVER DID
| IT!!!!!! Maybe you didn't give them the vibe that you would
| play along with this farce? I have often asked such people how
| this is true since they pay way less than private and recruit
| from a smaller pool. This just gets you dirty looks and some
| "I'm proud to serve" platitudes.
| andreisbc wrote:
| Why would you seek a job for a gov agency while working for a
| contractor doing the same thing pays better ? Status ? Benefits
| ? All day vacation ?
| noasaservice wrote:
| You only apply to 1 job at a time?
|
| I was applying to positions like 20-30 a day when I was
| looking. And that _included_ fed jobs.
|
| I heard back from many companies. Only 1 total ever from
| feds.
| wslack wrote:
| > I've tried to apply to federal positions for years. I won't
| even get so much as a "fuck off".
|
| Am guessing that you get (eventually) a message that you were
| "qualified but not referred?"
| noasaservice wrote:
| Unfortunately, not even that.
|
| There was 1 agency that did send back a "sorry not sorry"
| over a job that was admittedly a stretch.
|
| But aside that singular, nope. They're worse than normal
| companies in ghosting.
| mistrial9 wrote:
| gotta start somewhere.. empowering people is a big "yes" here..
| on the other hand, government in the USA is plauged by an
| outsourcing addiction. Get the budget and signature authority,
| say whatever you have to say in any number of meetings to get
| that, and then it is off to margaritaville while pressured, less-
| authority people are required to make things happen, and they in
| turn hire outsourcing companies, who then in turn run modern-day
| "IT shops" which vary wildly, lets say ..
|
| What effect does this good-looking GSA program have, over time,
| on this addiction to outsourcing for USA government work ? on the
| culture of bosses who run that, and on worst yet, companies that
| thrive on failure in government contracting.. which apparently is
| endemic.
|
| Sincere good wishes to the people who are in this for the right
| reasons. I have to call the dark side though, since empowering
| that dark side with lofty words and new budgets, is worse than
| picking up litter in the park on volunteer day and going about
| your own business.
| the_only_law wrote:
| > government in the USA is plauged by an outsourcing addiction.
|
| Favorite relevant story from recently: an old friend of mine
| who enlisted in the army told me he is unable to do the job
| they trained him to do rn, at least until the contractors doing
| it at the moment have their contract run out.
| temp8964 wrote:
| Why do I feel a strong anti-Asian sentiment on their homepage? Is
| it a shame to show Asian faces for them? Like they are shamed of
| the fact there are "too many" Asian male programmers?
| sumobob2112 wrote:
| why not work with an innovative contractor supporting the
| government instead?
| andreisbc wrote:
| Exactly. Seems like the US is pulling a PR stunt, most likely
| being a contraption of a whatever-congressman-and-his-friends
| with a plan to get richer, trapping nice kids into a yummy trap
| [deleted]
| lvl102 wrote:
| A word of caution: these programs sound great until you realize
| they're mainly there for big govt consulting firms to take tax
| money. It's the sad truth about tech and US govts. They don't
| actually want to change. They just want to appear that way. My
| two cynical cents.
| sophacles wrote:
| I can't believe that you expect to be taken seriously while
| pretending the millions of people encompassed by "tech and Us
| Govt" are all a single hivemind with only the one motivation.
| jessriedel wrote:
| Aren't things the opposite of how you describe? My
| understanding is that the big govt consulting firms exist to
| allow the govt to access competent developers who are paid
| market wages since the govt is constrained from paying govt
| employees adequately. The US digital corp is an attempt to hire
| good developers as govt employees who would _replace_ some of
| the current developers working for the big consulting firms.
|
| Now, whether the strategy of providing a less terrible govt
| work environment, and a more inspiring story, will actually be
| successful in outweighing the still-extant salary limits is
| very unclear. But this is at least an attempt to reduce the
| reliance on consult developers and the corresponding middle-man
| fees taken by the consultanting firms.
| wslack wrote:
| I understand this viewpoint but in this situation its not
| accurate. There are huge communities of people working to
| improve systems. 18F's github repos are public if you want to
| see exactly what they are doing: https://github.com/18f
| [deleted]
| andreisbc wrote:
| This is actually correct sir. We're not cynical, just
| rationalists
| kkfx wrote:
| Sorry but... I'm from EU and in my view USA Digital Corps have
| GAFAM as name, they are widespread in the world, the most
| effective intelligence system under the Patriot Act. They have
| many people coming from "official" USA intelligence...
|
| They even have uniforms, in the form of the casual suit and tie,
| more apt for their executive battlefields.
|
| Having a formal corps with military uniforms is just a kind of
| Barnum's Circle.
| FinNerd wrote:
| They need a sexy website. Feels like boomer org made worse by
| being drowned in DEI woke language. No very high competency young
| people would want to work for this IMO
| iaabtpbtpnn wrote:
| If I use cannabis, can I work for the United States Digital
| Corps?
| iaabtpbtpnn wrote:
| I see from the replies that nothing has changed. Try again next
| decade.
| CobaltFire wrote:
| Unlikely, as they require a background investigation and that's
| not legal at the Federal Level.
| rythmshifter03 wrote:
| what?
| apetresc wrote:
| Marijuana is a Schedule 1 drug at the Federal level. What
| is your confusion?
| noasaservice wrote:
| Your question also needs to ask about the status of Delta 8 THC
| as well.
|
| T*ump made that federally legal with the farm bill. Some states
| have banned it.
| ar_lan wrote:
| I torrented something when I was 17... I think I'm out :)
|
| When both the FBI and NSA came to my college they basically
| said that during a recruiting meeting and most of the students
| just left
| a9h74j wrote:
| There is understandable reason for them to ask a lot more
| about your past history of exilfrating infomation, than even
| drug use.
| faldore wrote:
| Federal employees and contractors are subject to regular and
| random urinalysis. Until marijuana is legalized at the federal
| level (which has been passed by the house but is not yet law)
| you could be terminated for marijuana.
| gavinray wrote:
| Why would anyone subject themselves to this willingly when
| you can get better pay and probably less tech-debt elsewhere?
| digisign wrote:
| It's not true, at least with contractors for software
| positions.
| andreisbc wrote:
| If the US representatives abuse alcohol and influence, can they
| lead the US?
| vkou wrote:
| Yes, there are different rules for executives and proles.
| Jtsummers wrote:
| I think the current cutoff is something like 7 years. So if you
| haven't used it within 7 years you are good (used to be 10,
| IIRC, and before that lifetime but that's been 20 years or so
| since that was true, I think). But this is for your background
| check/security clearance paperwork, I think it's a checkbox
| like "Have you used marijuana within the last X years? [check
| yes or no]". If you aren't going for an actual secret (or
| higher) clearance then the background check is very cursory
| (check financial records and criminal records, verify education
| and listed addresses for the reported period).
|
| EDIT: Also, in almost all clearance paperwork you only report
| back to age 18. So if you're a recent graduate (what this seems
| to be for) at around age 22-23, and you stopped after high
| school you likely wouldn't have to report anything at all.
| paulmd wrote:
| > If you aren't going for an actual secret (or higher)
| clearance
|
| Note that despite how important it sounds, "secret" is not a
| very high clearance at all. It is the actual lowest
| _classified_ status - there is "public trust" below that (eg
| for cops/etc) but that's not an actual classified standard,
| and FOUO/confidential/etc are not actual classification
| levels either, just handling guidelines.
|
| Any time you are working on anything military-related you
| will probably need secret clearance _at least_. Anyone
| working with even a basic level of knowledge of military
| technical or operational capability, or force strength
| /moment/etc, will be at least Secret.
|
| Anything that you think of as actually being deserving of
| "secret" most likely falls into the "top secret" category,
| "secret" is just the completely banal stuff, and you don't
| have to go far to bump into TS/SCI positions in STEM fields
| doing military contracting. Any sort of advanced research or
| development work is probably at least TS if not TS/SCI.
|
| Actual low-level enlisted don't need to be secret (notionally
| you don't need to know that stuff to "go there and shoot
| him") but all officers are cleared secret, for example, and I
| would guess probably NCOs as well (so there's a cap on how
| high you could be in the military without it). And basically
| everyone in the civilian world who interacts with the
| military will be secret.
| alexjplant wrote:
| You're confounding the investigation period for a clearance
| with what they'll accept as far as drug use. Generally
| speaking Secret clearances investigate back 7 years and Top
| Secret clearances go back 10. There are, however, questions
| on the SF-86 that are "ever" questions that ignore these
| timeline. Regardless you can have used drugs during these
| periods and tell them as such and there's a chance that
| they'll grant you the clearance. It's ultimately up to the
| people adjudicating the clearance and they use a reference
| guide that's periodically updated to determine this.
|
| Years ago the rule of thumb was that they'd give you a
| clearance if it'd been 1 year since you used marijuana and 3
| years since you used hallucinogens so long as you'd
| demonstrated a commitment to a drug-free lifestyle since.
| Anything serious like opioids or alcoholism would require you
| to have gone to rehab and seriously reformed your life.
|
| In more recent times they seem to have gotten more lenient
| regarding recent marijuana usage, but I've been out of the
| industry for a minute so I can't say for sure. What I've
| always told people is that if you want a cleared job and have
| done drugs then 1) tell the truth, and if that would get your
| clearance application denied then 2) wait until it's been
| long enough so that it won't and clean your act up in the
| meantime.
| killjoywashere wrote:
| There's tremendous opportunity to make connections early. I have
| a colleague who is 23 years old and planning an urgent, high
| 8-figure R&D effort. Like, that's the project for this week. Make
| no mistake, there's a shocking amount of bureaucratic trench
| warfare because everything is Balkanized, but the impact can
| staggering if you can execute.
| dimitrios1 wrote:
| > Empower the next generation of technology leaders to launch
| careers in public service and create a more effective, equitable
| government.
|
| Can someone explain to me how this program will achieve this? The
| problem of government inequity is unfair and unbalanced
| representation as a result of valuing corporations and special
| interests over the citizenry.
| scotuswroteus wrote:
| This shit entirely understates the political bullshit that any
| truly innovative approach to service delivery would encounter.
| Show us the Memoranda of Understanding with the unions running
| the bureaucracy before you tell us we can make anything
| resembling change.
| badrabbit wrote:
| You need degrees (college debt) and get paid crap. Why is this
| popular?
| andreisbc wrote:
| Because it gives unexperienced and young people the status they
| think they seek - also connections which are inevitable - while
| they will be ultimately transformed into the people of the deep
| state. And hey, that's fine - even the deep state needs new
| people right ?
| WestCoastJustin wrote:
| Anyone know what the red-tape / pay is like there? It seems like
| government organisations are just at such a disadvantage in terms
| of red-tape and large pay gap between the private sector. I know
| some have more discretion in their hiring ability, particularly
| in the defence space, but does it come close to private sector?
| You're probably better off working for a contractor working for
| the US Digital Corps than for them directly.
|
| My experience is working with the Canadian Federal gov at a few
| national research labs. It was amazing work but joining the
| private sector is a major culture shock in that you can pretty
| much do anything and get paid 4x.
|
| So, what's the incentive to work there?
| bmelton wrote:
| Red tape galore -- related:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30959520
| paulmd wrote:
| Unless this side-steps the GS payscale then no, it won't be
| remotely competitive with private-sector. GSA basically tops
| out at the salary of the average senior developer and doesn't
| even start at the payscale of entry-level FAANG.
|
| Plus you also will have to plan for the _reality_ of regular
| shutdowns during republican congress /democratic presidency
| situations - this occurs _frequently_ , the federal employees
| always get paid (or at least have so far) but bridge loans from
| credit unions (USAA, DFCU, etc) only go so far and you really
| need some cash savings as a federal employee.
|
| Benefits aren't great anymore, and it's hard to see how
| benefits won't be trimmed further in the future for younger
| employees. It's just too tempting a pot of money for lawmakers.
|
| Plus yes, red tape. Digital Corps and 18f and so on are
| attempts to remediate this, but it's just an uphill battle all
| the way, it's not an environment where you're going to change
| the world in a year, or even show meaningful progress in a
| year.
|
| And all the other "culture fit" issues. Smoke pot? Thanks for
| applying. Even if you don't, hope you like some dude staring at
| your dick a couple times a year as you pee in a cup to keep
| your job.
|
| Again, Digital Service, 18F, and Digital Corps are an attempt
| to remediate all this, but there is still absolutely no reason
| to work for the federal government outside patriotism. Like
| game development, they know they are free to continue the
| negative practices because there is an endless supply of
| patriotic bodies waiting outside for the chance to serve.
|
| I worked for a company that subcontracted on a ton of federal
| work and the federal-adjacent stuff (non-military) was the
| biggest waste of time there. One project was software support
| for addressing medicare requirements, that was shelved after it
| was finished, and the other was remediating a failed project
| from a big-name contractor that never worked properly due to
| keycloak issues, that was also shelved after we were done (but
| we did get it working). It took over a year of fighting to even
| get the software we were supposed to be remediating. The
| federal agency had no idea why we would want a copy of the
| software "for ourselves" when we were supposed to be helping
| states deploy it in their environment. What's a dev env
| precious? That's the level of competence the feds generally
| have.
|
| If you own the contracting entity (prime contractor is
| particularly juicy) federal is profitable, because you're
| drinking from the river as it flows by. Otherwise, as an
| employee, you are far far better working for a contractor that
| is federal-adjacent, to insulate you from "government work"
| issues as much as possible. And obviously as you can see from
| above - even that experience is not pleasant and you will have
| to drag them every step of the way justifying why standard
| engineering practices are standard.
| Jtsummers wrote:
| A few inaccuracies here, but one thing that's hilariously
| wrong:
|
| > Even if you don't, hope you like some dude staring at your
| dick a couple times a year as you pee in a cup to keep your
| job.
|
| That's for the military. Civil service gets to go into a
| stall and shut the door. Also, unless you've got a TS
| clearance, you can go _years_ between drug tests. Even with a
| TS, it 's very random, some people getting tested nearly
| monthly, and others every 2-3 years.
| wslack wrote:
| Many civil service jobs don't require drug testing at all.
| Jtsummers wrote:
| True, it depends on what you're doing. If you have a
| security clearance (which, importantly, is not true for
| all federal employees) then you are in a drug testing
| position. Otherwise, it depends on what you're working
| on/with. Like many jobs involving heavy machinery, wage
| grade employees without clearances are going to get drug
| tested, while a clerk in an office probably won't be in a
| drug testing position. Finance stuff? Probably a drug
| testing position, whether with a clearance or not.
| wslack wrote:
| Here's a job on budgeting with a secret clearance and no
| drug test requirement:
| https://www.usajobs.gov/job/646472000
| Jtsummers wrote:
| Then things have changed. Didn't know that, not that it
| impacts me at all.
| ch4s3 wrote:
| I tried to apply about 5 years ago and the process looked like
| it was going to take longer than a full set of Google
| interviews and it was going to be a big pay cut so I dropped
| out.
|
| EDIT* It seems I was thinking of the United States Digital
| Service, which is a different thing.
| CobaltFire wrote:
| This program is new for this year; you didn't attempt to
| apply for it five years ago.
| ch4s3 wrote:
| Ahh sorry, I was thinking of the United States Digital
| Service. I assumed they were related or maybe the same
| thing rebranded.
| killjoywashere wrote:
| Sleeping well at night when you're older knowing you helped
| Grandma get her social security checks, your cousin in the
| Marines got the surgery he needed, the Post Office trucks got
| the maintenance they needed. A good career doesn't need any
| public service, but most great careers probably do.
| WestCoastJustin wrote:
| Yeah, there is definitely something to be said for that.
| There is also the feeling though of knowing you afford a
| house, have a family with kids, and put them through college.
| So, there is sort of a balance here. Realistically, I guess
| you can have both, spend a few years there building your
| career then jump over to the private sector.
| [deleted]
| lukemercado wrote:
| This seems like an EXCELLENT way for junior engineers to finally
| get out of the "no job can't get a job" box. Super curious to see
| what comes of it, and to recruit those who complete the
| fellowships.
| cactus2093 wrote:
| Is this a real problem? The hiring market for engineers is
| really hot, and if anything tech really over-indexes on
| technical/coding interview questions and under-indexes on past
| experience and having a formal degree. If you can reliably
| solve medium Leetcode problems you can easily get a junior
| developer job at all sorts of companies (and hard Leetcode
| problems will get you a job at FAANG) without any past
| experience.
|
| I think the much more common problem for new folks trying to
| break into software engineering is "not very good at coding
| yet, can't get a job". Not sure if Digital Corps is optimizing
| for these people but they really should be (given that they
| can't compete with the private market on comp).
| vmception wrote:
| A lot of DC area people view federal public sector as the
| "amazing [stable] opportunity" and dont think FAANG
| opportunities as options, many dont know about them
|
| High five figure to low six figure salaries are the
| aspiration
|
| Everything else is too absurd or too risky
|
| Very risk averse dynasties there that will drill this into
| their neighbors and children their whole life
|
| Many contractors are also chasing a carrot on a stick hoping
| to convert to a federal employee if "mastuh is pleased"
|
| There is a whole industry there catering to that
|
| There are also a lot of opportunities for actually ambitious
| people such as making the contracting firm or selling
| something stupid to an agency that your friend working there
| signed off on
| pgcj_poster wrote:
| I applied, and was not accepted, to this program. I did a
| 5th-year Master's program in CS, had a part-time dev job in
| undergrad, developed a full-stack web app that has thousands
| of free users, and have been applying to jobs, without
| success, for the past 6 months. I can solve Leetcode
| problems, but have only ever been given one algorithmic
| problem in an interview. Perhaps I could get a job in FAANG,
| but I don't want to: I want a job that will benefit society.
| That market for junior engineers in government and non-
| profits is not "hot" - it's close to non-existent.
| R0b0t1 wrote:
| If you're not in the right area yes it is a huge problem.
| andreisbc wrote:
| You are too romantic about it. Read the other comments. This is
| such an excellent idea, but it's a closed sourced system
| wrapped into sweet package. I don't doubt the output of it, but
| c'man man, we know better right ?
| hans1729 wrote:
| Public sector IT was an extremely frustrating experience for me.
|
| - incompetent administration (org flow chart, constantly changing
| paradigms, misnomers ("open source" == we tape together stuff
| from public git-repositories, push nothing upstream, and
| outsource lots of core development))
|
| - administration's priorities change with every election (project
| funding as a flag in the wind depending on current political
| climate)
|
| - red tape everywhere
|
| - bureaucrats everywhere
|
| - the whole job-stack attracted incompetent people, the kind that
| values stability over deep understanding and progress. the kind
| where I thought "man, good that they are working here in
| [$current_politically_opportune_project] so they can't do actual
| damage somewhere else". this applied for the business
| administrators, the project managers, the "developers", the
| admins, _even a large part of the contractors_.
|
| - "you're working too fast! haven't been here for long, eh?"
|
| - compliance > security
|
| Never, ever ever ever again. Granted, this was in Europe, maybe
| the US sucks less in the public sector. I would bet a good amount
| of money that there is a large intersection of problem spaces
| among the regions though.
| behringer wrote:
| This is true in all facets of government.
| throwawaysleep wrote:
| I have been a gov developer. I have never been held to a lower
| standard, but a lot of that is not the developer's fault. It is
| that leadership is not technical. This is in Canada.
|
| A colleague still there tells me that they purchased a software
| library without consulting a single software developer.
| hans1729 wrote:
| Yes, I felt the same way, the fact that leadership was not
| technical was huge. But it's also the inherent reward
| incentives in a politically driven dynamic. The environment
| just felt cursed
| rhexs wrote:
| Same thing here friend! The trick is realizing that the federal
| salary and benefits package is absolutely astronomically
| generous for the amount of work that the average fed puts in
| per month.
|
| Then there's the standard 10% of them that struggle to carry
| the load, burn themselves out, and leave to double their pay at
| the same workload. Work hard, deliver more? At best you'll get
| a 1000$ yearly bonus.
|
| Slack off, deliver nothing? Same thing, still get promoted.
| throwawaysleep wrote:
| A ridiculous thing from my time in government was that
| promotions were interview driven only. If you aced the
| interview, you got a promo. Didn't matter if you did shit
| beforehand.
|
| A guy on my gov team got the promo over our by far most
| experienced and skilled developer as he spent his time
| practicing for the interview instead of working.
| wnevets wrote:
| Sounds like working for a large corporation
| abvdasker wrote:
| Yeah except you get paid half as much and have to wear a
| button down to work.
| gnulinux wrote:
| Not to mention if you fuck up, you're creating permanent
| record in your state's system. Whereas if something goes
| bad with a private employer, (unless it's gross) just quit
| and move on.
| wnevets wrote:
| >Yeah except you get paid half as much and have to wear a
| button down to work.
|
| that sounds like working for a large corporation.
| registeredcorn wrote:
| >maybe the US sucks less in the public sector
|
| lol
| CobaltFire wrote:
| For those people thinking this is a huge opportunity: there are
| 30 spots total for this year. This is a very small program, so
| will be highly selective.
|
| Also, since it's Federal and requires a Background Investigation
| drug use will be an issue. Surprisingly they allow fully remote
| though, which is a huge plus.
| andreisbc wrote:
| Being so selective means that only those with the highest
| credentials get approved - and we all know how these
| credentials can be harvestered: 90% nepotism and elitism, while
| only 10% skill. Those 10% will be the brains, while the 90%
| will bring the network onto which these solutions will be
| promoted
| the_only_law wrote:
| The clearance thing pisses me off. I saw a job listing, at
| actually decent pay, with some niche technologies that some
| people feel strongly towards (Haskell, etc.) albeit with a
| contractor not a gov agency.
|
| Form the description, it sounded like they had a contract to
| rip off QubesOS (or at least develop something which sounded
| eerily similar), which apparently requires one of the highest
| clearances possible.
| meatsauce wrote:
| "Equitable" means it will only be open to people with
| connections in special interests.
| sumitgt wrote:
| Unfortunately both this and USDS require the applicant to be a US
| Citizen.
|
| I wish there was a similar option for folks who are not yet
| citizens but currently work in the US tech industry (maybe in
| exchange for some sort of a streamlined path to citizenship).
|
| Similar to the (now paused) MAVNI program.
| lvl102 wrote:
| So now US citizens have to fight for US govt jobs too?
| LadyCailin wrote:
| Sure, and why not? I'd rather hire a competent foreigner over
| a lousy citizen any day. More generally though, I would
| support seriously beefing up the educational system, sparing
| no expense to ensure it's the best in the world.
| Unfortunately, the ones who tend to be against immigration
| also tend to be against improving education, and you simply
| must pick one or the other, or perhaps even both, if the US
| wants to stay competitive in the world.
| andreisbc wrote:
| My only problem here is that some people seem happy about this -
| and they have the best intentions. My opinion is that you
| shouldn't forget about the people behind these kind of
| operations. They clearly seem elitist, and tech&gov history
| showed us that these initiatives are mainly rigged for purposes
| unknown. "For the people", right ?
| bayareabadboy wrote:
| president wrote:
| To attract youth to a lowly paying government job, they need to
| appeal to emotion. Same way tech companies attracted college
| kids by telling them they were helping to "save the world".
| digisign wrote:
| From experience with a school age kid, this kind of language is
| being drummed into youth, aka brainwashing, at least in
| "liberal" areas of the country. It's not the worst thing I've
| seen so don't worry too much, but agree that it is mildly
| annoying.
|
| Edit: censoring this perspective is counterproductive I think,
| where even noticing the obsession with diversity framing will
| get you blacklisted. From history we know that suppression of
| ideas tends to end badly.
|
| It's the new "Red Scare" except the color meaning has been
| flipped from Communist to Republican.
| killerdhmo wrote:
| do you have a lot of experience with sophomore gender studies
| at "lower tier" ivies? Is there something specific you object
| to?
| ohCh6zos wrote:
| It's a way to signal who they're looking for without stepping
| into explicitly discriminatory language.
| kbash9 wrote:
| Mission: "...develop innovative solutions that make government
| work better for the American people."
|
| Values: Integrity, Inclusion, Impact
|
| Wouldn't hurt to add "Innovation" as a value for a team of
| technologists.
| mym1990 wrote:
| FWIW good things come in 3s and innovation could roll up under
| Impact.
| vogt wrote:
| I like that the Digital Corps exists in theory. I applied many
| moons ago, I believe during the Obama administration. Service to
| our country is something I feel is important so I applied to at
| least see if there was a fit.
|
| When I got to the phone screen, I made a point to ask if
| recreational cannabis would disqualify you from joining and they
| confirmed that yes, even if it was recreationally used, a
| positive cannabis result on a drug test would disqualify you.
|
| Major bummer, but unsurprising. The entire reason I asked was due
| to how many posts on HN I've seen about government agencies
| having a hard time hiring tech folks for this reason. I have what
| I believe to be a decently desirable skillset and a lot of
| tangible experience working in startups AND enterprise companies,
| and if I had to guess, would have brought some good value to the
| team.
|
| I hope (but doubt) these policies have relaxed.
| nbaugh1 wrote:
| The U.S. Digital Corps was launched in August 2021 by the Biden
| administration
| vogt wrote:
| Yeah, another poster pointed out that I meant the Digital
| Service and this was correct.
| rsstack wrote:
| Maybe you mean United States Digital Service?
| https://www.usds.gov/
| vogt wrote:
| Yes, this is actually correct. My mistake. Their missions and
| names appear to be similar enough that it tripped me up.
| Thanks for the correction.
| giaour wrote:
| Really happy to see this on the front page!
|
| One thing to keep in mind if you're interested in joining: the
| Digital Corps is for early career technologists, so if you have
| much experience in tech, you might want to apply to USDS
| (https://www.usds.gov) or 18F (https://18f.gsa.gov) instead.
| xxpor wrote:
| Until the GS salary cap is something that doesn't look like a
| bad offer from a decade ago, it'll be extremely hard to swallow
| the pay cut of working for the feds.
|
| I get the "public service" discount, but it'd have to be
| something like 30%, not 70%.
| aikiplayer wrote:
| It's definitely steep and getting steeper by the month. The
| other downside, that's actually more significant than the
| base salary difference, is the lack of upside from stock,
| etc. (which a sibling also commented on).
|
| However, there are a couple of significant things that are
| often overlooked. There's a strong mission that really speaks
| to some people. Additionally, there's a lot of structure
| applied which helps to enforce a work/life balance. Some
| people really want to dive in and work a lot of hours (which
| is generally allowed) but others (like me) struggle to turn
| work off w/o that structure.
| kache_ wrote:
| this a million times. I interviewed for the spooks, and the
| money they were offering was an absolute pittance compared to
| what I could be making
|
| just pay us, I'd be happy to come work. I know they have the
| money too, I pay double their offering salary in the taxes I
| paid in 2021
| jvanderbot wrote:
| Have you seen NASA salaries?
|
| Gov spending on salary and perks is really hard for congress
| to swallow (except for their own salaries). It just hits
| wrong during election season.
| dweekly wrote:
| Congressional members (House and Senate) earn $174k/year,
| which is rather less than leadership of comparable scope is
| paid in private industry.
|
| Of course, having powerful people who control trillions of
| spending be not be very well paid themselves above the
| table has...myriad exciting ways to go wrong.
|
| As a taxpayer I'd rather government leadership paid
| extremely well _and_ heavily fund GSA audits to ensure
| strong oversight (and jail time) for those that abuse the
| position. Fun fact: GSA saves taxpayers $10 for every $1
| spent.
| omginternets wrote:
| You forgot to factor in all the benefits and "perks", not
| the least of which is insider trading.
| ethbr0 wrote:
| Insider trading _is_ probably the least perk, if one
| wanted to abuse their government authority and access.
| There are myriad ways to go much bigger with corruption.
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| Insider trading is a perfectly legal perk to them.
| Corruption isn't.
| wpasc wrote:
| I'd bet the insider trading pales greatly in comparison
| to hiring ex-congresspeople for their access and contact
| sheet
| HWR_14 wrote:
| > Gov spending on salary and perks is really hard for
| congress to swallow (except for their own salaries).
|
| It's just the opposite. With a few rare exceptions, a
| federal employee cannot make more than a congressional
| salary. And since they make just over 174k year, that's the
| highest a GS-15 can make (after the mandated raises).
| Hence, GS-15s start at 172.6k.
| OrvalWintermute wrote:
| NASA federal salaries are on the higher end of the GS scale
| because we tend to recruit better talent, and some of our
| key locations are in cost high areas, near Washington DC,
| or Silicon Valley. Likewise with our contractors &
| consultants.
|
| However, we've been losing lots of talent recently to
| fortune 500 companies that poach our federal talent, and
| our contractor talent.
|
| 200% increases in compensation are not unusual for those
| leaving NASA federal, or contracting gigs.
| jakeinspace wrote:
| My project lead when I was a NASA contractor took a
| remote offer somewhere in the ~$350k range, which I think
| must've been at least a 200% raise, if not more. I don't
| believe he would have left if the agency were able to at
| least meet him halfway, but that's obviously not possible
| right now. NASA would save money in the long run by
| paying market rate imo, it's such a loss of talent and
| experience when any random startup with a solid funding
| round can poach the cream of the crop for a few hundred
| grand.
| the_only_law wrote:
| Yeah federal pay is rough and probably the primary reason
| I avoid government jobs, at least for the time being.
|
| I don't do anything remotely exciting, difficult or
| demanding for a company you've never heard of, yet I make
| as much as one of the higher paid NASA positions I've
| seen requiring extremely niche experience you will only
| get from and full of places. Probably more when you
| consider CoL and such.
|
| Similarly, I saw a position with everyone's favorite
| three letter agency. The job looked really cool, and
| required some modestly niche skillsets and experience in
| security, reverse engineering, exploit development. Only
| issue: the starting salary was very rough, particularly
| for the DC area.
|
| The other thing is just the bureaucratic nature of the
| pay scales. I've seen jobs asking for a PhD or
| significantly more in YoE that probably requires because
| that's what the GS requirements were. I'm not even sure
| if the usual "don't interpret job requirements literally"
| is of any value. After all we're talking about government
| agencies. I'd also hope agencies have become to relax
| degree requirements on certain types of positions but I
| doubt it. I was told for years, the federal government
| probably wouldn't hire me without one.
|
| All that being said, I'd probably be willing to hop on
| over if the work was really interesting and the pay
| wasn't complete atrocious.
| giantg2 wrote:
| Your comment seems out of touch with reality for most people.
|
| The US median dev salary is $110k and it looks like you can
| hit that as a GS-12 in most locations.
| chrisseaton wrote:
| > The US median dev salary is $110k
|
| I don't doubt you've looked that up and it's true if you
| say it is, but that number completely baffles me. How are
| so many devs so poorly paid?
| tick_tock_tick wrote:
| There is a lot of country between the two coasts. Hell
| most of the southern coast is still quite cheap.
| omginternets wrote:
| I suspect it's because "dev" is a fairly broad category
| that encompasses everything from "Wordpress CSS-twiddler"
| to "Big Tech Hotshot".
| mciancia wrote:
| I wouldn't be surprised if those statistics are not
| really worth anything. Like, it's possible they don't
| take under account people who are contracting,
| RSUs/options, yearly bonuses and whatever alse companies
| are offering now. Median base salary at 110k might be
| possible then ;)
| Goronmon wrote:
| _How are so many devs so poorly paid?_
|
| Maybe you are just out of touch with what your average
| software developer is paid?
| verisimilidude wrote:
| You may be living in a bubble.
|
| That's a normal (and still very good) salary for devs
| working in quieter metro areas.
|
| I left the Bay Area five years ago. My salary is now
| $100k, a substantial pay cut from my SF years. But
| quality of life is soooooo much better here, in so many
| ways. It's worth the drop in pay.
| ryukafalz wrote:
| Yeah, as someone whose salary has been around that amount
| recently (though at the moment it's slightly higher) 110k
| is not at all poorly paid. You can have a very high
| standard of living for that much in a lot of places in
| the US; I'm in Philadelphia and consider myself very well
| off making that much.
| giantg2 wrote:
| As a single person or with a family?
|
| Philly suburbs are quite expensive for housing. It seems
| about $100k to support a family is decent but not "very
| well off". I image that extra $10k could make a big
| difference. A single person making that (or a dual income
| family around $200k) would certainly be well off.
| ryukafalz wrote:
| I was single at the point when I was making around that
| much so that's probably the only fair comparison I can
| make. You're right that a family on just that income
| would be tighter. Between my girlfriend and I right now
| we're definitely not making $200k though and I still feel
| pretty comfortable. No kids yet though :)
|
| Philly suburbs can be expensive (although that's not
| universally the case) but Philly proper is relatively
| affordable.
| giantg2 wrote:
| I guess it depends on where in Philly and the suburbs you
| want to live, and it's tough to go apples to apples given
| that most of the suburbs are detached sfh with a yard and
| most of the stuff in the city is attached and have little
| to no yard.
|
| In either case, it's $300k+ to be in a decent
| neighborhood for about a 1500sqft house. Cheaper than
| many cities, but more than smaller cities or rural areas.
| And anything with land is outrageous ($500k+). And
| property taxes can be high.
|
| It really seems to be a tale of two cities. On one hand,
| housing can be affordable for the people making six
| figures, but on the other we have the highest extreme
| poverty rate for any big US city (not sure if that's
| still the case, but was a few years ago).
| ryukafalz wrote:
| Yes, that's true - it's not affordable for a lot of
| people who live here, because a lot of people who live
| here are very low-income. Seeing $100k described as
| "poorly paid" felt weird for just that reason though. By
| the standards of just about everyone I know outside of my
| cushy tech job, $100k from a single job is extremely
| privileged.
|
| Slight aside on yards, front yards are typically out of
| course, but I was astonished when I visited one of my
| coworkers in South Philly and he had a sizeable backyard
| behind his rowhome. Don't know how common that is,
| satellite imagery is too low-res to tell, but I see a
| decent number that look like they're 1/3 of the lot!
|
| Also, perhaps my standards are skewed - walkability and
| bikeability are pretty important to me, which means I'd
| want smaller lot sizes anyway. Big SFHs on big expensive
| lots aren't so appealing as a result :)
| giantg2 wrote:
| Yeah, I agree that $110k is decent and the median for
| devs.
|
| Most of the yards are small - a couple hundred sqft. So
| maybe we have different preferences for yards. I have
| fruit trees, a garden, bees, playset, etc. That takes up
| a lot of room. The garden alone is about the size of many
| of the yards I've been to in Philly.
|
| Yeah, walkability isn't great here. I don't feel safe
| biking on any road. There are quite a few cyclists around
| though, so it can be done (bunch of stores within 2-4
| miles).
|
| I hate how expensive land is around here. I'd love 10+
| acres. Rural areas are much cheaper.
| ryukafalz wrote:
| That's the direct tradeoff you make though - if you want
| to be near other people (which typically also means being
| where the jobs + interesting things are), you get less
| space. If you want more space, you can go live somewhere
| rural, but everyone else around you also gets more space,
| so there won't be much nearby.
|
| If you want a lot of space _and_ to be near a lot of
| people, you'll have to pay more. You're basically paying
| to have more than your neighbors at that point.
|
| (That aside, if you want that much land, why haven't you
| moved to a more rural area then?)
| giantg2 wrote:
| I don't really care to be that close to thar many people.
| But I do need a job, which is why I moved here.
|
| "That aside, if you want that much land, why haven't you
| moved to a more rural area then?"
|
| My wife won't go for it.
| R0b0t1 wrote:
| You tell me. Every time we have a thread where people say
| median compensation is $300k I seriously wonder where
| those jobs are and how to get them.
| krinchan wrote:
| They're in California/NYC and by the time you finish
| paying for housing and taxes you get <100k.
|
| Atlanta can get you to 200k with a (relatively)
| reasonable CoL but the current housing situation there is
| rapidly degrading, so get in fast if you're looking.
| Traffic is miserable, which is true about anywhere.
|
| However, the public transit is hilariously bad with a
| heavy reliance on buses running on hourly schedules and
| sitting in said miserable traffic. I think there's one
| very specific corridor that has the buses equipped to
| override the traffic signals, but it really led to
| absolutely nowhere useful to a tech worker and just
| mostly ran Emory students between dorms and campuses.
| They never expanded the idea any further. That said, if
| you can land a job and an apartment within walking
| distance of a MARTA rail station, you're living the
| dream. (Good luck with rent! Anything within a half hour
| walk of a rail station is 2x-3x the cost.)
|
| Any attempt to market Miami as "a tech hub" is a scam.
| The pay offered is completely out of step with the CoL
| _before_ COVID. You could swing a Miami senior level job
| with either an hour commute on some of the most dangerous
| Interstate in the USA (that 's using the toll lanes, too)
| or a two hour-ish drive + train + bus commute (one-way
| for both times) utilizing public transport.
|
| I can't speak much to Austin or Dallas, though I've heard
| highly conflicting anecdotes about them. I doubt you're
| finding $300k below a Senior Architect type title,
| though.
| pc86 wrote:
| Nobody is doing 2-hour one-way commutes utilizing three
| modes of transportation, especially now.
|
| Chicago has a great pay-CoL balance, especially if you
| want to live downtown, walk or take the train, and not
| have a car. But even commuting from the suburbs isn't
| bad. I-90 into the city is always a parking lot though,
| regardless of day of the week or time of day.
| kache_ wrote:
| yeah except I'm clearing 300 bones remotely :P
| pwdisswordfish9 wrote:
| Consider that your experience may not be representative
| of all programmers' experiences (even if you exclude the
| experiences of the ones that we could broadly agree are
| not among the competent ones). Life involves green lights
| and red lights. If you manage to hit a lot of green
| lights, it can be hard to grasp what's going on with the
| people who didn't. (This is true even if your number of
| green lights is average.)
| paulmd wrote:
| Developer salaries are very bimodal (or even trimodal).
| Working for a contractor pays like shit, and pre-COVID
| many non-coastal locations were also significantly worse
| than average. That group is just trying to churn out
| contracts at minimum-cost and that means squeezing wages
| too, generally they're not willing to go up, they'll take
| what they can get at fixed costs and modulate the work
| they take on to match staffing. It was usually $50-60k 10
| years ago and $75k ish territory nowadays I think. And
| sure after 5-10 years you might be making closer to $80k
| or $90k but that's still under-market for basically a
| senior dev.
|
| Then you've got "market-competitive" wages that actually
| needs to get stuff done on a fixed timeline and are
| willing to pay to get the staffing to do it,
| deliberately, rather than just letting people fall into
| it. And finally the FAANG club and lead/architect tier
| positions, paying the most for top talent, with the
| latter two cohorts being smaller.
|
| Think about the stuff that everyone was trying to
| offshore to india 10-20 years ago and that's the cheap
| tier. And there's a lot of it.
|
| When I was poking around after my bachelor's, IBM Global
| Services was hiring around $50-55k in my area for java
| developers.
| ethbr0 wrote:
| One of the best decisions of my career was avoiding a
| body shop like IBM consulting right out of college.
| gnicholas wrote:
| Two things to keep in mind: the federal government offers a
| very good pension, which most private employers do not. Also,
| if you have student loans and work for qualifying employers
| (govt and/or nonprofit IIRC), you can have some of your loans
| discharged after a period of time. But both of these perks
| require you to work for 10 or 20 years, in one branch or
| another.
| NtGuy25 wrote:
| Government pension is actually very bad. You pay 4 % of
| your salary per year, and get 1 % * years worked * avg(3
| top highest salaries).
|
| You get far more money if you put that 4 % into a 401k or
| other investment vehicle.
|
| Also, with loans being discharged, you have to have made a
| ton of payments, to the point that most will pay off their
| loans before they're eligible in a stem position.
| prepend wrote:
| The max GS15 salary is like $175k and there's lots of
| government benefits. Max GS14 is $150. Max GS13 is $125.
|
| And there's lots of benefits (23 paid days off, 13 sick every
| year), pension, etc etc.
|
| This won't compete with FAANG or with HCO, but in most areas
| of the country (or full remote) this is fine for a
| programmer's pay.
|
| I hear the complaint that fed doesn't pay for tech and I
| think that's not true.
|
| The BLS has median programmer pay $90k in 2020 [0] so
| government pay is certainly competitive. This is median too,
| while the lowest possible GS13 pay is $100k.
|
| [0] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-
| technology/...
| glowingly wrote:
| From my experience, GS14 and above roles are allocated in
| limited numbers to each program/branch/division. Of course,
| many other companies do this to some degree, and one
| obviously can rotate in the government. However, not every
| program will have GS14, nevermind GS15 opportunities.
|
| GS is also (like all companies, etc, etc) adjusted per
| locality, so not every GS13 step 4 will be the same.
| prepend wrote:
| From my experience, ICs in technical fields like
| programming, data science, and cyber get hired in as
| Gs13-15 in non-supervisory roles.
|
| Yes, GS is adjusted for locality and it's up and down.
| But $100k is the minimum for GS-13, step 1 in most
| localities and is higher in high cost of living areas
| like DC, NY, etc.
|
| But if you want a programmer job in government it's not a
| big pay cut unless you're a superstar working for Google
| or something. If it's a decision of random Fortune 500 or
| government, government will usually pay more, AND have
| more benefits and stability.
| glowingly wrote:
| I am in a HCOL area on the locality chart :/ We get hired
| in at $70k and this seems rather common among my peers +
| contractors, so I don't exactly know how someone is
| getting $100k at the door. People who have been here ~5+
| years _are_ GS13 or equivalent. However, most of us aren
| 't and I don't see any upward trends, as our GS14/+ slots
| are being slowly retired/transferred away. There seems to
| be a large age gap between the newer engineers and the
| older ones. Sounds silly, I know. I am wondering if most
| of us are going to wander off then come back for
| retirement? Or is the program doomed in the long run?
|
| Thanks. I think I just needed to see it from someone
| outside of my program.
| TheCoelacanth wrote:
| "Computer Programmer" is basically an obsolete job
| classification at this point. You want "Software
| Developers, Quality Assurance Analysts, and Testers"[1],
| which has 10 times as many people and a much higher average
| salary.
|
| [1] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-
| technology/...
| 5555624 wrote:
| Without locality pay, which varies by locality, a GS15 max
| salary is $146,757. The max GS14 is $124,764 and the max
| GS13 is $105,579. [0]
|
| The 23 paid days off per year is only after 15 years of
| service. Someone new, without prior military service, would
| start at 13 paid days off per year.
|
| The pension, for those hired after 1984 is roughly 1% x 3
| yr high salary x years worked. (If you your three year high
| salary was $100,000 and you worked for 30 years, you get a
| pension of $30,000 per year.) You would also collect Social
| Security. (Feds hired prior to 1984 have a much higher
| pension and don't get Social Security.)
|
| [0] https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/pay-
| leave/salaries...
| OrvalWintermute wrote:
| > The max GS15 salary is like $175k and there's lots of
| government benefits. Max GS14 is $150. Max GS13 is $125.
|
| They are actually higher than that based on locality pay,
| here are FY22 numbers.
|
| DC for example:
|
| GS12 Max $116,788
|
| GS13 Max $138,868
|
| GS14 Max $164,102
|
| GS15 Max $176,300*
|
| Silicon Valley by comparison:
|
| GS12 Max $126,742
|
| GS13 Max $150,703
|
| GS14 Max $176,300
|
| GS15 Max $176,300*
|
| > I hear the complaint that fed doesn't pay for tech and I
| think that's not true.
|
| While the federal govt does pay, in many cases the federal
| pay is not as competitive as it needs to be for high demand
| specialties that require a good amount of skills.
|
| Recently I was talking with an executive about building a
| software security capability within our engineering
| division for the space domain.
|
| Trying to hire great talent capping out @176k is simply not
| competitive with all the local FAANGs and startups doing
| specialized software security work in the
| aerospace/aeronautics domain.
| tristor wrote:
| I didn't think it could be that bad, and then I went looking.
| Apparently to get a pay level that aligns with typical base
| salary in tech for senior level IC positions, you'd have to
| be an agency director of a large agency or in the Cabinet.
| And that doesn't even take into account losing RSUs and
| smaller bonus payouts.
|
| This actually goes a long way in my mind of explaining why
| the US government does so much contracting of people for work
| as well. It's probably not possible in the current legal
| framework to pay high quality tech workers a fair
| compensation for the market, but they could hire a firm as
| contractors for a project and that firm could pay fair
| compensation. I just wish more firms were honest rather than
| milking the government.
| killjoywashere wrote:
| This is one of the great accomplishments of the "small
| government" efforts in politics: all the money leaves the
| system. Imagine a business that losses all it's money,
| every year, by design.
| dylan604 wrote:
| So, Uber? Or really any tech startup with aggressvie
| growth only surviving because of VC investment.
| teaearlgraycold wrote:
| Not weighing in on small/big gov. But a government isn't
| a business.
| giaour wrote:
| There are a few ways to get an IC role that pays more than
| the GS salary cap, but they are fairly rare. Some jobs have
| an "ST" level that is classified above GS for senior
| individual contributors in scientific or technical roles,
| and some agencies (like the CFPB) have their own pay scales
| that go beyond what the GS schedule allows.
|
| I only worked with one computer scientist in an ST role
| during my two years at USDS. He was an ACM Fellow and had a
| PhD from MIT, so it's not something anyone should expect to
| get just because they had "senior" in their title at a
| FAANG.
|
| Contractors don't have the same statutory caps on how much
| an individual role can pay, but salaries are part of
| contract bids, and a bid can be rejected if an individual
| salary is too high.
| paulmd wrote:
| Yup, to emphasize, this is "we want to hire linus
| torvalds for a specific project" level exception, not
| "we'll be handing these out to line programmers because
| comp is higher in that sector" level exception.
|
| You won't be getting one of those unless you're
| exceptionally well-known enough that an average
| practitioner in your field would perk up their ears when
| someone mentions your name as a potential hire.
|
| And really, for the tier of people that would be getting
| those exceptions, _that 's still not a great rate of pay
| and they'd still be taking huge paycuts to work for the
| government_. Like ok, we can get $300k a year for Linus
| but... he can walk into fifty companies and drop off a
| resume, cold, asking for triple that and get offers
| before he's back to his desk.
| bmelton wrote:
| > I just wish more firms were honest rather than milking
| the government.
|
| Generally speaking, they aren't.
|
| I remember commenting (years ago) on here on an article
| about the government paying a million dollars for what
| amounted to basically a Wordpress installation that anyone
| here could do in ~half an hour.
|
| Maybe a million dollars sounds like a lot, but to those
| who've actually _worked_ as a government contractor, it
| seems fairly reasonable.
|
| Consider:
|
| * You need to have past relevant qualifications for other
| government agencies, so the only people who can install
| blogs for the government are those who have installed blogs
| for the government. If nobody has ever installed a blog for
| the government, they'll leverage the closest relevant
| experience they can.
|
| * You need to have a contracts attorney on staff for the
| duration of the contract, and since you likely don't want
| to fire them every few weeks, that's a year's commitment at
| (conservatively) $200k
|
| * You need to have a physical address -- weirdly, the
| government isn't keen on home addresses and/or 100%
| distributed teams
|
| * You'll need to hire a software architect (maybe 2) to
| justify the changes needed to __competitors who also likely
| placed bids on your contract and didn't win but who also
| have existing contracts managing the database, network,
| etc__
|
| * Those competitors want you to fail so that the contract
| will get rebid so that they can try again, now armed with
| the information you presented them
|
| * Nobody in the government wants your project to succeed,
| and will actively try to get it to fail quietly
|
| * If it ever seems as though your project might achieve
| success, every stakeholder will want to jump on board your
| ship -- not in an effort to sink it, but so they can make
| their mark on the project and have their names associated
| with a potential success
|
| * It takes decision-by-committee to get even the smallest
| thing done, and a Wordpress blog is comprised of mostly
| small things. The smaller the thing, the bigger the
| committee. (I once had to bill the government 24 man hours
| at a median rate of $100 an hour because the CTO of the
| agency pulled 4 of us in a meeting for 6 hours to "discuss"
| which header background we preferred -- one was a winter
| shot that allowed visibility of the building, the other was
| a summer shot where trees obscured it... the winter shot
| felt dead and colorless, but the summer shot obscured their
| fancy new $130 million building)
| godelski wrote:
| I think you better gave examples of government being
| inefficient. But also I was to add that there are places
| that do milk the government. Both of these can be true.
| It's not homogeneous. But you're right that we should be
| more nuanced and it's good to have an insider
| perspective.
|
| For a more funny example of your point, I like The
| Pentagon Wars' Bradley tank evolution
|
| https://youtu.be/aXQ2lO3ieBA
| TYPE_FASTER wrote:
| That was amazing
| bmelton wrote:
| The accurate familiarity of that is exactly why I ~no
| longer~ work with the government
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| It's amazing (in the most uncharitable sense of the word)
| that a bunch of private sector office workers who joke
| about how relatable The Office is don't realize that
| stuff like Pentagon Wars (for feds) and Parks and Rec
| (for state and local government) are also basically
| documentaries for their respective industries.
|
| I could mortar the cognitive dissonance together and
| build a wall.
| samhw wrote:
| This got me reading about the history of 'armored
| fighting vehicles', and eventually this early model,
| which I still can't stop laughing at: https://upload.wiki
| media.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8b/Simms_Mo... It, uh,
| certainly can't be faulted for its complexity.
| crooked-v wrote:
| That's actually kind of a brilliant design given the time
| period, once you look at other designs of the era that
| either have no idea what they actually want to
| accomplish, or try to do everything and so succeed at
| nothing at all, or both.
| samhw wrote:
| Oh, tell me about it. I think that's the kind of
| innovation that's happening now with the drone warfare
| you see in Ukraine. People tell me that "Russia has 100k
| tanks to Ukraine's 10k", and I think: those high-level
| numbers do not matter; what matters is what happens when
| the two meet on the battlefield. If one $50k drone can
| consistently take out millions of dollars of equipment,
| it doesn't matter how expensive or numerous that
| equipment was, or how good it would be at fighting some
| hypothesised similar adversary.
|
| The superpowers of the world have gone through several
| successive 'generations' of military technology without
| really having a war in which to use them. (Just
| skirmishes with pre-industrial desert and jungle people,
| and the occasional mismatched murky proxy war with
| export-grade technology.) These mega-elaborate aircraft
| carriers and fighter jets and tanks are like radar-
| enabled cavalry, and will be taken out with drones and
| handheld rockets, and whichever modern-day Kroll is
| clever enough to strategise will make an absolute, uh,
| killing.
| godelski wrote:
| As someone that works in ML, this is actually what is
| concerning to me. Everyone is talking about AGI
| (artificial general intelligence) but I don't think
| that's something of huge concern yet. We have already
| entered a world where you can create drone "mines". It is
| cheap and easy to build a drone that can have an
| explosive payload, hide, and automatically seek out enemy
| combatants or vehicles. (Note that drones are pretty
| difficult to detect) The tech is a little difficult now
| and requires oversight if you don't want to violate
| international war laws, but it is definitely possible
| (and rapidly getting better).
|
| > If one $50k drone can consistently take out millions of
| dollars of equipment, it doesn't matter how expensive or
| numerous that equipment was, or how good it would be at
| fighting some hypothesised similar adversary.
|
| Because this isn't true anymore. It is really a $1k drone
| being able to take out millions of dollars of equipment
| with a 70+% success rate. That's a real game changer.
|
| We don't need AGI to for ML to be dangerous. We just need
| people to use existing algorithms dangerously and/or
| recklessly.
| paulmd wrote:
| Ironically the amount of oversight and red-tape is so
| intense that it becomes self-defeating. The only
| companies who are capable of successfully bidding and
| executing the contract are the exact sorts of companies
| you don't want winning the contract. The small, agile
| team full of domain experts isn't going to be able to
| jump the hoops to win the bid - they don't even have a
| contracting lawyer / combat-disabled veteran owner / etc.
|
| I don't like the idea of my tax money getting wasted by
| Lockheed or Accenture on a failed project with no
| recourse, any more than anyone else, but I'm not
| convinced that micromanaging the bidding and execution
| actually resolves that. At a certain point you're chasing
| away the talent and selecting for the players that are
| willing to play your games rather than the best ones to
| do the job.
|
| The way I always viewed it was that the USG just was
| willing to pay a large amount of money to sit in meetings
| and talk to contract officers, and if that's what they
| want to spend their money on, fine, we'll provide that
| service. Which is exactly why everything is expensive and
| nothing gets done.
|
| It's the contracting version of "nothing is getting done,
| let's add a daily meeting to make sure that productivity
| remains high". At a certain point you'll chase away the
| 20% who are getting the work done, but you'll always have
| the 1xers and 0.1xers who are content to sit in meetings
| and take home a check every 2 weeks. If you keep doing it
| - that's what you'll be selecting for, and you'll end up
| with the Dead Sea effect but with contractors instead of
| employees. Which is where we are today, it's a toxic
| environment and the only thing that can survive are
| organisms that are specially adapted for it.
| bmelton wrote:
| Agreed completely, and many times the contracting owner
| is a figurehead with zero job responsibilities who just
| takes down a grand salary so that the contractor
| employing him is eligible for more contract
| opportunities.
| wslack wrote:
| There are many situations where the government isn't
| managing work well but because that fiscally helps the
| contractor, the contractor works - hard - to keep the
| status quo in place. That is to the detriment of all of
| the other companies that could do it more efficiently.
|
| This is also why we need strong technologists in
| government to ensure the contracts are written correctly
| from the start.
| jrib wrote:
| So did you go with the summer shot or winter shot?
|
| I can understand having the sentiment:
|
| > Nobody in the government wants your project to succeed,
| and will actively try to get it to fail quietly
|
| But I actually think Hanlon's razor applies. I think
| individuals do want your project to succeed but there are
| often systemic issues that make it seem otherwise. These
| systemic issues are not easily affected by individuals.
| NovemberWhiskey wrote:
| Right. There's literally no-one paid by the Federal
| government that makes the same as your average Google L6,
| according to what I can see; and to get to that kind of a
| level you need to be e.g. Joe Biden, Tony Fauci.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| The current system also incentivize quid pro quo via
| revolving door for high level government employees. You
| accept under market pay with the government, but expect to
| be repaid for favors to the governed entities by taking a
| job with them afterwards. Or selling your services to them.
| Or getting a niece or nephew hired. Etc.
| brimble wrote:
| As someone _not_ in FAANG, I was super-interested in their
| remote option, since it 'd have been much more like that 30%
| cut (for me) than a 70% cut--until I saw the weird "term of
| service" limitation. Half the point of taking a government
| job is the retirement, and stable health benefits et c. over
| the long haul! Taking that out of the equation ruins the
| value prop.
| lastofthemojito wrote:
| Maybe I'm reading it wrong, but I'm seeing this as an
| analog to the Peace Corps or AmeriCorps (maybe the name is
| swaying me there?). Something specifically for people right
| at the beginning of their career to have an opportunity to
| perhaps do something meaningful. And once they have that
| experience on their resume, it'll help them do the next
| thing.
| brimble wrote:
| The program I looked at back then read like it was
| targeting established professionals.
| giaour wrote:
| The US Digital Corps (a new program) is meant to be for
| people at the beginning of their careers.
|
| GP was referring to the US Digital Service, which is for
| mid- and senior-level tech folks.
| brimble wrote:
| Yes, absolutely correct and I should have been clearer
| about this, this was the (at this point) long-running
| USDS program, _not_ this new thing.
| giaour wrote:
| Plenty of people move from USDS to permanent civil service
| roles, but they do need to plan for it and apply. Your time
| in USDS counts towards government retirement benefits, but
| you can't stay in that particular position for longer than
| 4 years.
| brimble wrote:
| Ah, the language on the descriptions back when I was
| looking at it made it seem like you _had_ to leave when
| it was up, and didn 't make it look like transferring was
| a possibility (wouldn't you take a big cut, moving
| somewhere else, or do you keep your USDS GS rating?).
| giaour wrote:
| Everyone I saw moving to other government roles were
| going to equivalent or higher ratings. I'm actually not
| sure what the rules are if you were to go from a GS-15
| position to something lower.
| jacobian wrote:
| If you're a software developer, and your goal is to maximize
| income, then yeah, don't work for the federal government. If
| your goal is to do meaningful work that has a tangible
| positive impact on average people's lives, while being paid a
| fair living wage, then these jobs are unbeatable.
| time_to_smile wrote:
| I did a stint in the government working for a team that
| eventually had a lot people go over to 18F. I joined on
| hoping to see exactly what you describe, willing to take a
| pay cut for meaningful work.
|
| My experience was very different than yours has been. My
| impression was that it was largely bureaucrats looking to
| further their own position in the massive bureaucracy. It
| was virtually impossible to do any "meaningful work". The
| handful of people passionate about doing good for the world
| were constantly blocked by other bureaucrats who were only
| interested in maintaining (or expanding) their tiny island
| of power they had accrued.
|
| I vividly recall needing data from another agency to help
| solve a problem we were working on and being told that it
| would be virtually impossible to get any cooperation
| because it would make them look bad if we succeeded using
| their data. My entire time as a Federal employee was filled
| with similar such moments. All of the work I did, which
| ended up proving some seriously privacy vulnerabilities in
| another project, was dismissed because people didn't want
| to hear it. The experience forever changed my view on
| government.
|
| The plus side is I did meet some fantastic, although
| terminally frustrated, people while I was there. It is a
| great place to meet people who have similar ambitions.
|
| For someone looking for meaningful work I would advise
| staying far away from the federal government.
| wslack wrote:
| I'd be interested in hearing more about this if you are
| willing to share (same username on twitter)
| stirfish wrote:
| What are some government software projects that have a
| tangible positive impact on average people's lives?
| xxpor wrote:
| The SSA has to be able to get checks out to everyone
| every month.
|
| The IRS has to process tax returns and get out refunds.
|
| The USGS has to be able to detect earthquakes.
|
| The NWS has to be able to deliver critical weather data.
|
| I could go on and on.
| prepend wrote:
| Healthcare.gov is the project that kicked off USDS
| (because the site was so horrible and the contractors
| charged billions). That site impacts millions of lives.
|
| There's lots of important government projects. I actually
| think the rate of BS/meaningful may be higher in
| government than private given the number of cow
| clicker/BS-type projects.
| omginternets wrote:
| What's the salary cap?
| giaour wrote:
| $176,300 (per https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-
| oversight/pay-leave/salaries...)
| l33t2328 wrote:
| And people consider that a bad offer a decade ago? I
| consider that a dream offer today.
| tdhz77 wrote:
| Former Fed for 10 years. Loved working for the Federal
| Government. I made 100k+ as a software engineer.
|
| I left Federal Service in February 22 because the private
| sector doubled my salary.
|
| My work is much easier in the private sector and I work a lot
| less. I'm getting paid double. I have a team now I can rely
| on. I didn't have this in Gov.
|
| Many Gov IT positions will go unfilled for months. I had one
| organization offer me 25k, fully remote to work there and I
| declined. Why? The amount of work is insane for a individual
| developer.
|
| This idea that we shouldn't pay people because they work in
| Government is insane. Peoples mistrust of government, but
| really it's misguided.
| [deleted]
| tehwebguy wrote:
| > I had one organization offer me 25k, fully remote to work
| there
|
| Per year? That is $12.50 / hr
| the_only_law wrote:
| I worked for state government, in a very red state (read,
| does not like to spend on government) for my first "real"
| job at around $37k, circa 5-6 years ago.
| toomanyrichies wrote:
| This gets to the heart of a contradiction in red state
| philosophy which is actually quite hard to solve, at
| least in my mind. On the one hand, it's understandable if
| someone doesn't trust the government to spend their money
| wisely, and if they use that as a justification for
| voting for smaller government budgets. I get that part
| completely. Governments have little if any internal
| motivation to spend your money wisely. If anything, they
| have a vested interest in spending 100% of their budgets,
| _regardless of whether it 's spent wisely_, so that their
| budgets don't decrease in the following fiscal year.
|
| At the same time, "if you pay peanuts, you get monkeys".
| If red states don't pay competitive salaries in
| competitive fields, their citizens shouldn't be surprised
| if they end up scraping the bottom of the barrel to
| source their public servants. The service they experience
| while interfacing with this dreck then further reduces
| their faith in government, and the whole thing becomes a
| vicious circle.
|
| Again, this is a hard problem to solve. I don't know what
| the answer is, but it seems to be rooted in a mis-
| alignment of incentives in government spending.
| asiachick wrote:
| Yes, I don't know what would work. I often like to bring
| up Japanese trains/subways which are privately owned and
| AFAIK the reason it works is because the train companies
| own buildings and land around their stations so they have
| a positive feedback loop, the more people ride their
| trains, the more their buildings get used, the more their
| land is worth, and visa versa. ~10 or so of the famous
| buildings in Shibuya are owned by the Tokyu Corp
| including the famous one with the giant screen, the 109
| building (10 + To, 9 = Kyu), and the new 50+ story one
| directly over the station. The also own the building
| Google moved to. They own grocery stores at probably
| around 50% of the stations on their lines.
|
| Other examples include any building you see named Atre
| (https://www.atre.co.jp/) which are shopping centers
| above JR train stations owned by JR.
|
| I have no idea what the equivalent would be for
| government IT, nor am I saying all government services
| should be privatized. I do agree though that it's about
| incentives.
|
| Even in Japan people complain about government
| construction projects where the incentive is always to
| spend all the money so near the end of the fiscal period
| a bunch of random unneeded projects start to make sure
| all the money is spent for fear that budgets might be
| lower the next year if they don't use all the money.
| UweSchmidt wrote:
| The actual "philosophy" is the privatization of
| government functions. Concepts like "libertarianism" and
| "government is inefficient" are constructed to push this
| agenda. In the US this force can be so destructive that
| it willingly starves the government to prove its
| inefficiency and pushes services to the private sector,
| which is oh-so-well-alligned with its incentives
| (healthcare, owning infrastructure and other natural
| monopolies).
|
| If the Digital Corps can't get it done with people who
| can only make 25k a year, I guess we need some free
| market consultants for 200$/hour!
| pc86 wrote:
| Why do you assume that these ideologies are "constructed"
| in order to support a pre-existing agenda, rather than
| the (imo) much more likely possibility that the ideology
| is legitimately held and the "agenda" flows naturally
| from that belief?
| [deleted]
| avgcorrection wrote:
| I don't think it's a contradiction. It's a cogent and
| coherent philosophy.
|
| Claim that government doesn't work - defund it in the
| name of it being bad - government works even worse -
| repeat.
| zippergz wrote:
| I agree that this is a problem, but I don't think it is
| that simple in practice. My personal observation moving
| from a blue state to a red state a few years ago is that
| the quality of the service I get from the state and local
| government is drastically better in the red state. I
| don't think I can read very much into that, since it's a
| minuscule sample size and every state and municipality is
| different. But it's striking to me how much nicer the
| employees are, how much better the services are, and how
| much less apathetic everyone seems to be, despite what I
| assume has to be lower pay.
|
| I don't agree with the policies of most of the local
| elected officials where I live now, but that is more
| about bigger picture items. As far as day-to-day
| operation of the government, I can't say with a straight
| face that my old, deep blue, west coast community did
| things anywhere near as well as my new red home state.
| tdfx wrote:
| I think government work culture is handicapping the
| salaries more than anything else. If a consultant comes in
| for a year at $200/hour, the government ends their contract
| when they're finished with them. When the government hires
| someone at $50k/year, they are stuck with that person
| pretty much as long as that person wants to continue
| working there. There's a common joke with civilian defense
| employees that you can't get fired without committing a
| felony. Government work culture has this maternal mentality
| where it feels the need to care for workers from cradle to
| grave. You can never get rid of low performers, there's no
| layoffs when priorities change, you just have the same
| people that need to be shifted around to do a mediocre job
| elsewhere. It's completely immune to outside market forces
| and that makes it literally impossible to compete with
| private sector salaries, who have no problem laying people
| off if a project doesn't work out.
|
| Each person hired by the government is a massive, open-
| ended liability that can most likely never be fired, never
| be demoted or take a pay cut, regardless of changes in
| circumstances for the employer. I think the USDS was a huge
| step in the right direction by focusing on having "tours of
| duty" where the term of employment is fixed. I think the
| government should adopt that much more broadly if it wants
| to be competitive with the private sector.
| throw7 wrote:
| NY State has non-unionized positions called MC
| (Management/Confidential). My understanding is that it's
| sorta like contract work... you are "appointed" on a
| yearly or session basis. It's not a panacea though... if
| you look up kaloyeros, you'll see the dark side. It's
| disheartening how a single person in a particular
| position can bog down and kill the organization. It's not
| an easy problem to solve.
| NovemberWhiskey wrote:
| USDS salaries are even more absurd relative to the
| responsibility of the positions. Think 75%+ compensation
| cut even at the top of the GS scale for the calibre of
| people they are looking for; and the primary benefits of
| a Federal job like a guaranteed pension and job security
| don't apply in a meaningful way.
|
| You _really_ have to be in it for the service aspect.
| t-3 wrote:
| I think there's an argument to be made for the networking
| benefits of government and military jobs. Having the
| experience and connections they bring may open doors that
| purely commercial employment does not.
| dgfitz wrote:
| A lot of people cut their teeth in government defense
| jobs and jump to a contractor position doing basically
| the same thing for double the salary.
| bee_rider wrote:
| I know there are non-corrupt cases of this, but it does
| seem like a close neighbor to things like regulatory
| capture, etc...
| DiggyJohnson wrote:
| I think it is a neighbor, as you said, and I'd go so far
| as to say that this is transparently a goal of this
| program.
| [deleted]
| dogman144 wrote:
| Partnership for Public Service, a much heralded
| public/private partnership between MasterCard, Workday
| (sp?), MSFT that interviews and places cybersec grads into
| GS roles for 2+ years and then preferred interviews into
| private sector, were insisting:
|
| GS-7, and max, maybe, but would be hard, GS-11. Experiences
| of selectees pushing back on that salary due to how low it
| was vs. the market ($30-$50k) with requirements to live on
| DC or similar were met with almost disbelief and offense
| from that org when candidates pushed back, because the
| program was for "new grads."
|
| Knew someone who turned it down and took a private sector
| interview/offer going on concurrently for $145k remote,
| despite providing offer/pay stubs to try at help the GS/PfP
| teams meet the on-paper salary even remotely close.
| csa wrote:
| > GS-7, and max, maybe, but would be hard, GS-11.
|
| I'm guessing that this was actually a 7/9/11 position,
| with automatic annual promotions (apprentice, journeyman,
| master, iirc).
|
| Still... that's _really_ low for someone who can get a
| decent tech job in the private sector.
|
| Note that an ambitious person with the right skill set
| could probably be GS-15 in the DC area in their late 20s,
| and they would hit the GS salary cap soon thereafter. I'm
| not necessarily saying that's a good thing (total comp
| still low), but I just wanted to throw that out there.
| dgfitz wrote:
| It's rather hard to get hired in a spot over GS 11/12. It
| happens but it's not common. From 13 on I believe
| promotions are in front of a panel. Getting hired as a 15
| would usually imply the hire-e was recruited.
| CobaltFire wrote:
| Unfortunately the GS salary bands are pretty below market for
| everything and the quality of people that is resulting in
| shows.
|
| I recently got offered a GS-11 (with promotion to GS-12 after
| a year) position and it's just not worth it. This wasn't for
| tech either; this was for a rather odd skill set.
| giantg2 wrote:
| "This wasn't for tech either; this was for a rather odd
| skill set."
|
| Well this sounds like a story.
| CobaltFire wrote:
| Security Manager. I deal in Personal, Physical,
| Communication, and IT Security as an Active Duty member,
| and since I'm retiring they wanted me to shift to a
| Personal/Physical SecMan that handles thousands of
| clearances and multiple TS assets spread around a couple
| sites.
|
| Odd, but not that exciting. :)
| giantg2 wrote:
| So what I'm hearing is that you're Sam Fisher and this is
| your cover story.
| pclmulqdq wrote:
| I was offered a GS-15 a while ago and even that was a lot
| lower than a starting FAANG salary for a new grad. I would
| happily work for the USDS or a TLA for a 20% pay cut, but
| the process of getting anywhere near that is a nightmare.
| It seems like the path is generally to work your way to
| GS-12 or higher, then quit and become a contractor for the
| same group.
| giaour wrote:
| GS-15 salaries top out at $176,300 in the DC metro area.
| (Most (all?) USDSers get exactly that salary.) That is
| certainly more than I made as a new grad at a FAANG!
| xxpor wrote:
| It is for me too, but new grads at FAANGs today are
| getting 200k+ TC offers.
| paulmd wrote:
| You wouldn't get hired at GS-15 as a new hire. You might
| reach that after 20-30 years, and you'll need to get a
| Ph.D.
|
| Also, DC Metro is an extremely high CoL area (not SF
| levels but probably around Seattle levels). Normal GS-15
| pay is $112k-146k and you'd trend towards the bottom of
| that in most areas.
|
| So, $112k average at the peak of your career, with a
| required Ph.D. More realistically as a new hire you might
| be GS-12 (which only takes a master's) which is $68k-89k,
| so you make $68k in most areas. That's certainly not
| great as far as competitiveness with tech salaries,
| that's pretty close to the bottom of the market these
| days for a _new hire working entirely remote_ , not even
| highly-desirable talent.
| [deleted]
| pclmulqdq wrote:
| I should have said starting TC, not salary. When I looked
| at it years ago, GS-15 salaries capped out at the average
| salary of a Google L3.
|
| It looks like it may be a little above L3 salary today
| (moving in the right direction!), but still far below L3
| TC, and a Google L3 job is not even remotely comparable
| to a GS-15 job.
|
| IMO if the government had a separate band of GS pay for
| highly competitive job markets which paid 50-100k more,
| they would be a lot more successful.
| vkou wrote:
| I was not a new grad, but I started as an L3 (which is
| what new grads are hired at) at Google, ten years ago, in
| WA.
|
| My take-home in the first full year at work was $147,500.
| The second was $178,500.
|
| Feel free to adjust for inflation.
| CobaltFire wrote:
| Essentially yes. Lockheed already has jobs posted for
| higher pay than was on offer for that skillset and has
| asked me if I'd be interested in talking to them.
|
| Since that skill is odd but required by every single
| contractor that does classified work there's a whole lot
| of opportunity out there I wasn't aware of until
| recently. The lack of quality people doing it in the GS
| ranks now makes a whole lot more sense to me. Prior to me
| understanding that it was just an annoyance.
| tonymet wrote:
| What does 18F mean?
|
| Our name is short for the address of the GSA building where
| we're headquartered in Washington, DC: 1800 F Street.
|
| For those curious about the inappropriate-sounding name
| ericmay wrote:
| When I saw that, the first thing that came to mind was that
| it's the military occupation specialty (MOS) for US Army
| special forces (18x).
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Army_Special_For.
| ..
| wmeredith wrote:
| Am I naive? How is "18F" inappropriate?
| z3c0 wrote:
| Eighteen-year-old female
| dmead wrote:
| Sadly, I had to turn down an offer from usds a few years ago.
| Seemed like really great people to work with :(
| notreallyserio wrote:
| Do you still have to be straight-edge to get hired by the feds?
| uhtred wrote:
| I've been thinking about tax payer funded public technology
| infrastructure recently with all the posts about the next google
| / improving web search. Why couldn't we have a tax payer funded
| but fully independent office that creates essential online
| services such as web search?
|
| I suppose the main argument against it might be privacy concerns
| or censorship / propaganda. But with no commercial interests I
| think privacy would be better protected. As for censorship /
| propaganda - the BBC manages to stay pretty neutral in the UK.
| fn-mote wrote:
| Interested? Too bad. "Applications are currently closed."
|
| Huh? Maybe it's related to the FAQ: "Why is there a limit to the
| number of applications in each track?"
|
| Ok... so presumably they were not closed two hours ago when this
| hit HN? This isn't sending the message that the program is
| serious, it's sending the message that they cannot handle even
| the volume of applicants that they are getting right now - in
| spite of the majority of the posts here dumping on government
| jobs.
| pgcj_poster wrote:
| I applied when applications opened in November. They were
| upfront about the fact that they would only look at the first
| 300 applications -- which they received in the first week. They
| had engineers review the resumes, which were allowed to be
| 3-pages, which I imagine is responsible for the low volume.
| tomrod wrote:
| I submitted it because I find the effort interesting. I am not
| involved with it nor did I realize it was closed. My apologies.
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