<story><title>The U.S. Air Force learned to code and saved the Pentagon millions</title><url>https://www.fastcompany.com/40588729/the-air-force-learned-to-code-and-saved-the-pentagon-millions</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>yazaddaruvala</author><text>I&amp;#x27;ve heard that the salaries of government employees are capped. I&amp;#x27;m very curious how this will play out.&lt;p&gt;The Air Force can easily afford to pay Silicon Valley salaries (sure the officers who are being taught to code can be paid less), but if the Air Force is artificially limited by red-tape to offer competitive salaries, wouldn&amp;#x27;t these software developers choose to leave as soon as they&amp;#x27;ve learned?&lt;p&gt;The other issue is paying these officers competitive salaries, would have quite the ripple effect. Higher ranking officers would all need to get paid more, or software developers would need inflated ranks, but with some designation where rank did not determine command.&lt;p&gt;I have zero insight and am just speculating. If anyone has more insight I&amp;#x27;d love to hear it.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>oliwarner</author><text>This is a bizarre thing that keeps popping up here. This assumption that as soon as somebody learns how to code, they pack up and move to the Bay Area. Since when was Silicon Valley the only place with competent software developers? We exist all over the planet, often getting paid very different amounts, and usually, yes, very much less than Bay Area developers.&lt;p&gt;In reality, the USAF here is competing against the cost of defence contractors. Which it turns out, is pretty easy because they&amp;#x27;ve been charging megabucks for everything for two decades because &lt;i&gt;their&lt;/i&gt; only competition has been other defence contractors. Thanks to politics, right or wrong, they&amp;#x27;ve had no capacity to ramp-up on in-house development and submit their own bids to really compete on price.&lt;p&gt;I really hope we&amp;#x27;re entering into an age of reality where public organisations (military, government, healthcare in the civilised world, etc) —and more, the people funding them— realise that in-housing development work is so much cheaper than farming it out.</text></comment>
<story><title>The U.S. Air Force learned to code and saved the Pentagon millions</title><url>https://www.fastcompany.com/40588729/the-air-force-learned-to-code-and-saved-the-pentagon-millions</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>yazaddaruvala</author><text>I&amp;#x27;ve heard that the salaries of government employees are capped. I&amp;#x27;m very curious how this will play out.&lt;p&gt;The Air Force can easily afford to pay Silicon Valley salaries (sure the officers who are being taught to code can be paid less), but if the Air Force is artificially limited by red-tape to offer competitive salaries, wouldn&amp;#x27;t these software developers choose to leave as soon as they&amp;#x27;ve learned?&lt;p&gt;The other issue is paying these officers competitive salaries, would have quite the ripple effect. Higher ranking officers would all need to get paid more, or software developers would need inflated ranks, but with some designation where rank did not determine command.&lt;p&gt;I have zero insight and am just speculating. If anyone has more insight I&amp;#x27;d love to hear it.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>MithrilTuxedo</author><text>One thing I was disturbed by going from the US Navy to working privately in software development in Seattle is how much of a secret pay is in the private sector.&lt;p&gt;You can pretty much look up how much money anyone in the military makes. Base pay is trivial to look up, and all the other allowances (housing, hazard, etc.) can be looked up.&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.dfas.mil&amp;#x2F;militarymembers&amp;#x2F;payentitlements&amp;#x2F;military-pay-charts.html&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.dfas.mil&amp;#x2F;militarymembers&amp;#x2F;payentitlements&amp;#x2F;militar...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;The same is true in the government, AFAIK.&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.opm.gov&amp;#x2F;policy-data-oversight&amp;#x2F;pay-leave&amp;#x2F;salaries-wages&amp;#x2F;salary-tables&amp;#x2F;18Tables&amp;#x2F;html&amp;#x2F;GS.aspx&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.opm.gov&amp;#x2F;policy-data-oversight&amp;#x2F;pay-leave&amp;#x2F;salaries...&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>