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Comment by NovemberWhiskey | Hacker News Reader

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.

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Outside of the federal gov, the benefits make it difficult decision to leave .gov mid-career. (Federal pensions are not as lucrative)

It is rewarding work, especially if you’re self-motivated as there’s always new interesting work. But the salaries paid at tech companies are so nuts it’s difficult to ignore.

The place I used to work at has attrited about 30% of staff between burnout from 18 hour COVID work to greener pastures. One guy I worked with went from $125k to $500k. Assuming the tech economy doesn’t implode, even the awesome pension and benefits just aren’t worth that much.

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.

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.

I know there are non-corrupt cases of this, but it does seem like a close neighbor to things like regulatory capture, etc...

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.

A goal to get people into government service? Yes. A goal to enable regulatory capture? Definitely not.

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