吃皇粮, 成为政府编程员路线详解

之前发过一篇关于自己在国防当编程员的帖子，后来有很多地里的朋友加我询问细节，于是我便想写一篇关于如何入门吃皇粮的文章。一下内容主要分这么几个板块：申请政府工作的要求，Clearance申请，政府工作人员组成和待遇，军工企业，和适合去政府的人群介绍




申请政府工作的要求

• 公民
• 一个STEM 的学位
• 能过背景调查
  

Clearance申请

• 申请必须由公司sponsor, 就像h1b 一样。雇佣你的公司会给你一个号，你用这个号去到DoD 网站上填一个叫SF-86 的表。
• 表里需要填过去7年里的工作，住址，学校，朋友reference等其他背景信息。
• 他们会把你所有工作的地方发信件，问你以前有没有做出什么出格的事，比如violate 什么Security protocol 之类的。
• 他们会派人interview 你给的reference， 会问你有没有回国倾向，有没有反政府倾向等等
• 他们会查你信用记录等等，我10年前用1万现金买了一辆车都被查了出来。最后解释清楚还是顺利拿到了secret clearance
• Secret clearance 是每十年要重新调查一次，TS/SCI 是每五年重新调查。
• TS/SCI 需要过测谎仪，比较严格，如果失败，secret 可能会被取消，我个人不建议去做需要TS/SCI的工
  

政府工作人员组成和待遇
Reddit 上一个老美讲的比较好，我就直接copy 过来了, 加黑我觉得的关键的部分
So there are basically 4 options:

Gov't Employee - I've never been an employee of the Federal government, though I worked state/local for a time. Federal employees are on the GS scale and are rather hard to fire. Their lives seem boring to me and I never felt much desire to be one. I've interacted with many and they seem intended to function as low-level bureaucrats spending most of their time in meetings.
. Waral dи,
Defense Contractor (employee) - This is just being a normal employee of a big corporation which just happens to build missiles or spaceships or whatever. Security clearances are often involved, but not always (there's a lot of white-world administrivia to manage). You fill-out a W-4 for your tax withholding at hire, and each year you get a W-2 to plug into TurboTax, just like most salaried professionals in America. As a full-time employee you get decent private healthcare insurance, a 401(k), vacation time, and sometimes overtime. As a valued employee, you also get training, sometimes significant training, and often tuition reimbursement. It's a good gig where you're well-compensated and get to work on massively cool shit, and I heartily recommend it at least for a time.

Contract Agency (employee) - You go to work for a "placement agency" of some sort (TechUSA, Hudson Consulting, Ameritech, there are hundreds of 'em). You are an employee of that company, and again you do the W-4/W-2 thing, get benefits (whatever they offer), qualify for a 401(k), possibly some vacation time, etc. They will then place you at a "real" defense contractor, where you'll sit in cubes alongside the "real" employees, typically with a different-colored badge. It's not "as good" as being an actual employee of a big defense contractor because you're a temporary asset: they generally won't pay to train you, and defense companies typically won't train you, so you're very much a second-class citizen. You'll get frozen-out of most "all hands meetings" and company briefings at your defense workplace, and it's a little disheartening. Also, you'll be shopped-out to the defense company at one "bid rate," from which the contracting agency will keep a slice for your benefits and their profits, passing on your "pay rate" as salary. The gap between bid-rate (which you're not supposed to know) and pay-rate can be disheartening should you learn it.

Self-Employed Contractor - In this scenario, you cut-out the contracting agency, and contract yourself to the defense company as a 1099. The good news is that your "bid-rate" becomes your "pay-rate" — you get to keep all your income, which can be considerable. The consequence is that you're on your own for making quarterly estimated tax payments, you have to arrange your own health-care, you get no vacation or sick days etc. You can make a lot of money this way, but you have to be your own CEO, CFO, HR and of course Engineering Lead. Typically also involves more travel or remote work (not of necessity, that's just how I've seen it typically play out).

Edit: If I were to rank them by income potential, it would be:

Self-Employed > Defense Contractor (Employee) > Gov't Employee > Contract Agency (Employee)

If I were to rank them by desirability from my own standards of comfort, convenience, work-life balance and interest/challenge, it would be:

Defense Contractor (Employee) > Contract Agency (Employee) > Gov't Employee > Self-Employed

军工企业
大的军工企业：Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Northrop Grumman 等等等等
值得一提的是每个公司领域不一样，比如Booz Allen Hamilton (斯诺顿原来干活的地方) 主要是 FBI, CIA 这些intelligence, 雷神, Lockheed, 主要是武器开发
与私企大公司不一样，越大的军工企业待遇越没有小的政府合约公司待遇好，原因的花可能就是大的军工企业好进一些，人多工资就会分的明确一些。
每年政府在国防开的钱最多，这些公司都是政府养的，非常有钱

适合去政府的人群

• 要WLB的人。政府活从来不加班，40小时干完走人，假期也很多。而且deadline 很少，没meet deadline 也不会失业，跳到另一个合约就好。
• 不在乎钱稍微挣的少点的人，如果去FAANG， 可能能拿300k， 400k, 在政府干career 上限可能也就200k。 温水煮青蛙，就是稳定性高，一辈子不用担心失业
• 门槛低，不用刷题，扯扯嘴皮就好了， 因为美国严重缺科技人才，他们很难雇到人，只要符合之前提到的三个条件，加上自己有些经验，还是比较好进的
• 对于找不到大厂的new grad 我建议还是去申申国防职位，因为待遇一开始还比较高，门槛低，工作比较闲，可以有时间刷题，为未来跳槽做准备。这样可以减小精神压力
  

那最后祝大家都能找到自己喜欢的工作！~ 加油鸭

如果还有什么问题都可以加我微信：404543400
我在波士顿，欢迎小伙伴找我玩~

看到不少发帖的同学想做一下回复，关于funding cut我觉得完全不用担心，拿到Secret Clearance  10 年任何政府工作随便干, LinkedIn到现在每天还好多公司联系我，各种机会，TSA, DEA, 好多好多机会。对于打工的我们公司政治完全没有，因为PM一般都是gs, 和我们contractor 利益不冲突，不会micro manage 你。说亚洲人少的可能咱们干的地方不一样，我在波士顿干活地方很多亚洲人，上面的头头都是哈佛毕业的亚洲人。有人说career path 短，我觉得是不正确的，career path不是很短，而是很长，只是上升空间很短，因为你是contractor, 不会给你管理岗位

zaty 发表于 2020-11-3 04:49
这个的前提是得是公民，外加要查很多东西。
个人在政府做了两年，觉得其实政府失业下岗的问题一点都不比普 ...

有clearance 的话不在乎funding cut, 随便跳槽，一般consulting 公司会立马派去其他合约。除非你在的是小地方，跳了之后需要relocate, 会比较麻烦。亚裔很少，不知道您之前在什么地方？ 我在波士顿，里面头头都是亚裔，而且很多华裔越裔美国人，情况可能不一样。我在软件公司，对冲基金，startup 都干过，压力很大，公司政治也很厉害，而且各种ddl。政府的活是我干过最轻松而且拿钱最多的。我觉得适合大部分人，但是必须学会玩这个game 才可以，在哪里都是一样的

最关键的问题是大多数都没有公民身份啊

这个的前提是得是公民，外加要查很多东西。
个人在政府做了两年，觉得其实政府失业下岗的问题一点都不比普通企业好。
虽然说是吃皇粮，但是年轻人在funding被砍得时候，是非常容易成为受害者的。
一代领导一代想法，没啥是绝对保证的。
并且亚裔很少，我经常觉得自己永远都是个工具人。
如果我是公民的话，我第一份工作一定不会在政府干。。。

现金买车有什么问题

fartogo 发表于 2020-11-01 23:52:31
现金买车有什么问题

被问了现金来源

感谢楼主分享～ 同在波士顿，自学转码，没有对应专业毕业证，不知道能不能找到那种普普通通的政府码农工作诶

April233 发表于 2020-11-02 09:39:54
感谢楼主分享～ 同在波士顿，自学转码，没有对应专业毕业证，不知道能不能找到那种普普通通的政府码农工作诶

建议上个bootcamp 或者ICC 混点经验，简历上有相关经验就可以申

这个牛逼了，谢谢分享！估计过几年等我们拿公民了我老婆会比较喜欢这种慢悠悠的没ddl的工作吧

公民还是太难了..

我本科学校（国内）有个老师是phd毕业后去雷神工作了几年的。。这种是他刚毕业就拿到公民身份了吗？。。而且不知道为什么他在美国待了十几二十年又跑回国教书了。。