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Comment by jrockway

16 years ago

Why do people deal with security clearances and government jobs? The pay is better in the private sector, and fucking up won't land you in prison.

The market is clearly not efficient.

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jrockway

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yummyfajitas  16 years ago

The job is more stable and there is less pressure to perform. You'll never be outsourced, and you'll never be passed over for promotion in favor of Raju or Yun. If the project doesn't move quickly enough, your dept will just get more money.

The government is a great place for mediocre people to work.

  • yan  16 years ago

    you summed up exceptionally well some of the reasons why I'm leaving. Having said that, gov't can allow you to work on some extremely interesting problems and data sets that you just won't find anywer else.

    Still astounds me how you can have such an eclectic mix of brilliant and less than mediocre people working on the same projects. I guess that's everywhere though.

    • elblanco  16 years ago

      I think in the private sector the you find the 80/20 rule (20% of the people do 80% of the work) while in my experience, in government it's more like 95/5 (5% of the people do 95% of the actual work). It can be excruciatingly frustrating, but you are right, the types of problems and the datasets are not ones you'll find in your average fortune-500 corporate entity.

natep  16 years ago

Having a security clearance can be job security for the private sector, too (well, government contractors). I interned at a company that decided they needed to do a large round of layoffs. To my knowledge, nobody with a security clearance lost their job, even though it was a 'classified' project that was lost.

bigmac  16 years ago

There are private sector jobs that require security clearance and pay well. Consider Lockheed Martin, Northrup Grumman, etc. Lockheed on GlassDoor: http://www.glassdoor.com/Salary/Lockheed-Martin-Salaries-E40...

  • jrockway  16 years ago

    But ones that don't pay almost $100,000 more:

    http://www.glassdoor.com/Salary/Bank-of-America-Vice-Preside...

    The top end of "Senior Developer" at Lockheed is around $100k. The top end for the same job at BofA (with an impressive-sounding but meaningless title) is $200k. And you don't have to lie about being investigated by the FBI. And if you get bored, you can just jump ship to their competitors across the street.

    Dunno, but I'm not convinced that anyone should worry about security clearance unless they are completely unable to write even the simplest computer program.

    • dagw  16 years ago

      Some people choose their jobs based what they find interesting, not on how much the job pays. So, depending on your background, the cutting edge research at Lockheed may be far more interesting to you than the cutting edge research at BofA.

    • bigmac  16 years ago

      I'm doubtful that anyone with a VP-Level title at BofA is writing software. I have a feeling you're comparing entirely different jobs here.

      Additionally, Lockheed built (among other things) the SR-71 and the F22. Its probably a safe bet to say that writing the control systems for those machines took more skill than "the simplest computer program."

      2 replies →

  • AndyKelley  16 years ago

    Lockheed pays well, but they are more pleased with themselves about being a large company than actually getting things done and innovating.

  • yummyfajitas  16 years ago

    The link you provide suggests LM doesn't pay well at all. $50-100k for software engineer? $168k for "Systems Engineer Senior Staff"?

    • bigmac  16 years ago

      Bear in mind that the link lists averages across the entire US. Its giving salaries everywhere form Akron, OH to San Diego, CA.

      Clearly they aren't necessarily top-end Silicon Valley salaries, but people working with security clearances can still make respectable salaries.

Kadin  16 years ago

You're conflating two very different things. Lots of people have security clearances and still work for private-sector companies (contractors). They just work on government contracts, sometimes in addition to traditional commercial work.

Other people work for the government directly, and most of these people (that I've known) also have security clearances, although there are some government jobs that probably don't require one. Why people work directly for the government I have no idea -- good pension plan, I guess? Doesn't appeal to me in the slightest.

But government contracting can be good work and good money IMO. There's more paperwork and overhead than straight commercial work, but you sometimes get to solve weird/unique problems too.

In some areas (DC) there is a big pay difference depending on what level of security clearance you have. Someone with TS/SCI can expect to make very good money, on top of whatever their experience and education would dictate, as a result of holding the clearance. This is because there are some projects which require people with those clearances, and for the highest clearances it's a relatively small pool of people (they're expensive).

However I'll agree with you on the market being inefficient. The labor market very rarely is, however. The natural tendency of people to not want to move around all the time ensures a certain amount of inefficiency, before you even involve the government.

chancho  16 years ago

Early-career research positions for cleared PhDs at gov't labs pay much, much more than the equivalent positions at universities (post-doc, lecturer, etc.) and still allow you to publish.

hga  16 years ago

One very simple reason that one of my friends has been enjoying for some time: it allows you to continue your programming career past age 35-40. This part of the market, where they care if you already have a clearance and can do the job, but not your age, is much more efficient than the civilian US market.

And I'd be surprised if the pay is much better in the private sector for equivalent IT jobs; I've never heard any programmer with a clearance being upset with pay or not being able to live the lifestyle he liked (well, as long as it was average American suburban).

"Fucking up" is pretty easy to avoid; you can talk about the technology you're using (e.g. Suns/UNIX, .NET, Java (the CIA was a 100% Java shop in the middle of the last decade), just not about the domain. Which is often true in the civilian market, it's just that the penalties are higher.

amalcon  16 years ago

Job security. Governments are more stable than big corporations, and are liable to have any cost-cutting initiatives neutered.

That, or wanting to live in the DC area. Some very large percentage of the jobs there are either government or government contractors.

elblanco  16 years ago

You might be surprised what a clearance is worth over private sector pay.

That being said, private sector work is usually for more fulfilling and less frustrating.

Working a private sector job, with a clearance (and the pay bump that brings) making software for the government, now that's not a bad way to burn through a work week.