I thought the same thing and asked her about the IT Project Manager and the the Network Engineer jobs.
I assumed the PM position required a masters degree… she claimed it didn’t and also paid up to 85k depending on experience. Not what I had in mind at all. She did say they might have filled it though.
The Network Engineer job paid $60k. Seems reasonable to me for a mid- level position. Wasn’t expecting that much either really.
I work less than 40 hours a week. I also have a gov’t job. I was doing a little bit of everything and enjoyed it until we got restructured (seems to happen a lot in Gov’t) I don’t care for my job too much now but the benefits and salary are great. I also work from home one day a week. I’m hoping to move out of NYS in the next 5 to 7 years but I will definitely stay in the Gov’t. 20+ years to retire plus military time gets added on to my pension, no brainier there. Plus there’s a lot of uneducated (at least in my agency) people in IT so it won’t be hard finding a job out of state.
Generally I agree with you 100% but in my case I got my job because I was a Disabled Educated Veteran. I’m not sure you would call that loyalty or not. You’re right though…every other IT/ skilled labor related job I had was a joke and I must of left at least 7 different companies with-in a years time because of salary/ benefits. I can’t say anyone of those employers lost sleep over it.
Nonsense all the people saying public service is not a good gig.
I work in public safety, and our people are well taken care of. You can retire in 20 years with pension, most people stay on longer to get a larger pension.
I work 40 hours per week, have 5 weeks vacation with matching sick time. 13 holidays, one personal holiday. Weeks of training time. Tons of conferences in vegas, south padre island, etc.
Totally OT but…the pension system presents an element of risk, this ain’t our Grand Parents economy anymore. Legacy cost has delivered several crushing blows in recent years. To me it’s a bit like a game of musical chairs.
I’m the IT manager at a small non-profit with 1 tech working under me. I’m not saying it’s not stressful due to being the go to guy for the whole organization but they’re super flexible on time, give us vacation out the ass, and the benefits are pretty decent (even though I don’t take them because my teacher wife’s are better). What does suck is that no one in the organization has any idea what IT is which makes for some frustrating conversations. Also, the pay isn’t the greatest but with a 10 month old I’ll take a hit in pay to be able to get in late because I had a rough morning getting her around and no one bat an eye at me.
I agree. I’ve been with the Gov’t for 2 years. Since then I’ve gotten a 20k pay raise, earning 12 hours of PTO and 8 hours of sick time a month and I work from home once a week. Actually with the weather I’ve been home since Tuesday. I’ve had maybe 4 calls I had to take care of. I can retire when I’m 55 with a pension, TSP(401k) and SS (later on). My military time also gets added in to my retirement.
There’s a VA hospital around here that I’ve applied at but never got a call. Their desktop support position pays more than my IT manager position here. Thing that sucks for me is veterans obviously get priority so it’s harder for me to get through without some military time.
++ I have some friends in the public sector specifically EDU that always try and get me to go, when I try and explain the highest possible salary I could start at is still a 30-40k paycut they whip out that benefits BS and I mean it is BS. On top of that your skills tend to stagnate in those types of jobs.
x2 on both statements. The pension system isn’t what it once was, if you don’t think the boomers are gonna suck it dry before their offspring can collect you’re a fool IMO.
I like my job in EDU (Academic Health Center). The best part about my job here is the ability to be in open environment where some level of experimentation is encouraged. I’m not locked into one single job duty with tunnel vision like some other positions I’ve seen. It’s that experimentation that has allowed me to gain so many of the skills that I now have. Of course you have to do much of it on a shoe string budget, but with so much open source and freely available stuff out there, you can really learn a lot.
You can definitely make more money elsewhere, though.
I can agree with a lot of statements here about the public sector. Like I said in previous statements my career is lacking but my wife stays at home with my 2 kids, I’m home by 330-4pm everyday, work from home once a week, pay, benefits… etc.
As much as I strive to better myself in every aspect including my career I have no room to complain. Having a potential of low end 6 figures / year is worth some sacrificing I think. Plus I’ve been in my position long enough to move up to a pay grade in another gov’t position/ agency which I attend to do hopefully in the next 5-7 years.