Time to find a government job?

Wall Street Journal ^ | Kris Maher

[wallcrawlr]

Is this a good time to seek a federal job?

David Mihalick started business school this fall, intending to pursue a corporate-finance career. But given the lackluster job market, he now plans to explore the possibility of working for the federal government. "There's something to be said for [the] job security" associated with government work, observes the 29-year-old student at the Babcock Graduate School of Management at Wake Forest University in Winston Salem, N.C.

[asformeandformyhouse]

Your best bet is to land a government spot where you can gain experience that corporations will need later, suggests Andrew Sherwood, chairman of New York human-resources consultants Goodrich & Sherwood Associates Inc. You can win recognition within an agency by working for a well-known mentor. Or, latch on to an issue and "establish yourself as a brand name," Mr. Sherwood says.

Yeah that sure beats the hell out of working your way up the corporate ladder through years of honest to goodness hard work and experience gained by actually producing something for society. You can always just be a Govt leech.

[Carbonsteel]

It helps if you can pass yourself off as some kind of minority.

Besides, I don't think the founding fathers ever intended for a third of the nation to be employed by the government.

[Marysecretary]

My husband retired from the Postal Service. Good job, good benefits, decent retirement, although he can't get social security benefits. He advises anyone to get a good federal job if you can. He loved working for the post office and would still be doing it if he could have been transferred to a facility closer to our town. He'd go in at 2:30 a.m. and drive an hour to work every day. He rarely missed a day unless there was an ice storm. It got to be too much for him and he opted for an early out, but he misses his job still today and it's been 10 years since he retired.

[Alberta's Child]

He advises anyone to get a good federal job if you can.

Maybe this is just a personality thing, but in my field I couldn't imagine a more useless thing than a career in government. In fact, any resume I receive from someone who has worked extensively in government is immediately put in the "rejected" pile. In my business, government employment is synonymous with a lack of ambition.

[d101302]

Agreed. Generally the average government worker rapidly becomes unemployable in the private sector. A resume showing a significant amount of employment as a government bureaucrat is a major red flag, IMO.

[taxed2death]

Ha, Ha, Ha....I'm still laughing....I couldn't agree with you more!!!!!!

Just slide into another useless Gub-mint job, lay low for 20+ years, mooch of the hard working s.o.b's in the private sector.



What a life.

[mikeb704]

Generally the average government worker rapidly becomes unemployable in the private sector.

As a retired bureaucrat, I can attest to that.

[meowmeow]

But if you do have half a brain, you can write your own ticket because you have no competition. My super-smart husband has done very well in the guh-ment. As for me, I am the ultimate overpaid leech…the government contractor!

[mikeb704]

But if you do have half a brain. . .

Talk about an unreasonable expectation . . .

[Marysecretary]

I think it all depends on the kind of person you are and the job to which you aspire. There are many good people in government jobs. You just don't hear about them.

[Alberta's Child]

There are many good people in government jobs. You just don't hear about them.

Oh, you're right about that. I was specifically talking about my field of work. When I was in school I obtained some information about potential employment with several different government agencies. Once I saw all the different forms and applications, with idiotic questions about race, ethnicity, etc., I decided not to bother with most of them. In my mind, no employer who was concerned about stupid, irrelevant things like that was worth working for.

[VOA]

bump

[VOA]

Generally the average government worker rapidly becomes unemployable in the private sector.

Well, at least for two of my chemist friends who went to work for the EPA, the question
would be "why would they ever leave for the private sector?".

Both of them, with only bachelors in chemistry from a small college, are making more
with the EPA than they'd make in the private sector...and of course they have
career-long sinecures and benefits that just won't quit.

I'm an idiot who didn't listen when they tried to get me to join them.
But I suspect the mind-numbing paperwork would have driven me crazy in a couple of years.

[Marysecretary]

PC has ruined our nation. I long for the days when we could say what we wanted, tell any ethnic joke we wanted, hire anyone who was qualified regardless of color... I don't know if we'll ever see those times again.

[CWRWinger]

"There's something to be said for [the] job security" associated with government work,

This guy is a candidate for the title of "dead wood" in the private sector.

[Sloth]

Yeah that sure beats the hell out of working your way up the corporate ladder through years of honest to goodness hard work and experience gained by actually producing something for society. You can always just be a Govt leech.

Count me with the leeches. I wanted a private sector job (and would still prefer one) but being a National Merit Scholar with a chemical engineering degree didn't get me one acceptable job offer from anyone but the state.

So instead I am a mindless, unproductive bureaucrat. Am I happy about that? Not really. But I would not want to work for supposedly for-profit companies that act more like corrupt leftist governments than capitalist enterprises. I pay ridiculous taxes -- why shouldn't I suck off the gov't tit for a while?