
NSA’s top talent is leaving because of low pay, flagging morale, unpopular reorg - sea6ear
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/the-nsas-top-talent-is-leaving-because-of-low-pay-and-battered-morale/2018/01/02/ff19f0c6-ec04-11e7-9f92-10a2203f6c8d_story.html?utm_term=.0388eaf826c3
======
smallnamespace
It seems like it's pretty hard for the government to compete with private
industry in compensation. Federal pay grades are capped by Congress, and the
top grade is around ~$150k a year [1]. And note that since it's the top of the
scale, you have to start people off lower so that there is salary progression.

Pretty sure a top cryptographer or security expert should be worth several
times that, especially if they are also dealing with classified information
and safeguarding all the data collection (e.g. if the NSA is going to spy on
us, wouldn't you like that to be as secure as possible?).

This is another reason why we're going to enter an era of corporate feudalism.
There has been a cycle of:

1\. perception of gov't incompetence

2\. normal people ask 'why are we paying people so much for doing a bad job?'

3\. gov't pay scales fall further behind private industry

4\. rise in relative mediocrity

5\. repeat

I think voters largely don't realize how much competence actually costs in the
market now and will vent about their justified perceptions of inequality by
preventing equalization of pay between the gov't and private sectors, but that
will paradoxically just make things worse in the long run as the private
sector snaps up all the talent and we end up with a barely-functioning federal
bureaucracy.

[1] [http://work.chron.com/nsa-pay-
scale-16399.html](http://work.chron.com/nsa-pay-scale-16399.html)

~~~
eadmund
The problem is that we can (and should!) raise government pay scales, but we
must _also_ make it easier to fire people (or manage them downwards) for
incompetence. Government work is for two types of people (and there's some
overlap on the Euler diagram): patriots, and folks who can't hack it in
civilian life.

It's not just a 'perception of gov't incompetence': it's a widespread
phenomenon. Government employees tend to excel at working organisational
politics (i.e., in serving their organisational customers) rather than in
serving their taxpaying customers. Government work is a kind of kabuki
theatre, in which everyone agrees to praise the emperor's new clothes and
ignore the boy who points out that he's naked.

The unfortunate thing is that government work is really important: it
_requires_ the best and the brightest, not the lazy and the uninspired.
Patriotism should of course be a _sine qua non_ for the civil service, but so
should excellence. We should pay market rates, but we should pay them for
market quality.

Raising rates without working to improve quality would mean getting mutton
when we pay for lamb.

~~~
snowwrestler
It's popular to say things like some government employees are "folks who can't
hack it in civilian life," but there's basically no evidence this is true.

First of all, let's make sure we look at the full scope of civilian life with
a sober eye. Anyone working the counter at your local Post Office could easily
work the register at any grocery store in your town. And any medium to large
company has plenty of internal politics. Don't make the mistake of comparing
the worst case of government to some idealized notion of private enterprise.

Second, take a look at what happens to people who do leave the government.
Very often, their salaries go up in the private sector. This is especially
true for specialists like the folks who work at the NSA. Seems like they can
hack it.

Folks who have not worked for the government, or very close to it, have a hard
time comprehending the fundamental differences between government and private
enterprise. For one thing, when you work for the government, many rules of
your job carry the force of law. Being too flexible might not just get you
fired, it might get you prosecuted.

And there are _so many rules_. I'll give you one example scenario: a person
leaves their job, and a subordinate steps up, takes on their workload, and
does great.

In a private company, you'd just promote the subordinate. You already know
they can do the work, you retain institutional knowledge, and it's easier to
hire junior positions. Efficient and effective.

But in most federal agencies that would be illegal, as it might permit some
form of corruption. The subordinate would have to keep doing the extra
workload, while the supervisor requisitions a new position to replace the old
one, and then runs a (highly regulated) open public application process. The
subordinate can apply too, of course.

This is not because the supervisor is some terrible inflexible or dumb person.
_The rules are just stricter and more burdensome in the government than in
private enterprise._

Why? Because everyone loves to believe the worst about the government, so it's
easy to sell voters on the necessity of a shitload of burdensome rules.

So: if you want people to act smarter in the government, you have to give them
permission to act smarter. Firing has little to do with it. You have to give
people the opportunity to try things and make mistakes in good faith.

~~~
pc86
> _It 's popular to say things like some government employees are "folks who
> can't hack it in civilian life," but there's basically no evidence this is
> true._

Have you ever worked for government? I'm a civilian contractor in a software
architecture role to a public safety agency in a state government. Half the
"senior application developers" haven't written code in 15 years and don't
know what a unit test is. There are maybe 2-3 individual contributors for each
manager. Not team lead, manager, and is in a $105-110k+/yr position that does
annual reviews, on call scheduling, etc.

The floor I'm on has 25-35 developers, DBAs, and BAs, and I can count on one
hand the number of people who could get hired into a junior technical position
at my employer. There are people who are unironically counting the days they
have left until they can retire and draw their pension when they have more
than 5 years left.

> _Anyone working the counter at your local Post Office could easily work the
> register at any grocery store in your town._

And they'd take a 60% pay cut to do so, wouldn't they? Anyway, this is about
folks in technical roles. Running a register and handing out stamps isn't
particularly technical.

> _Second, take a look at what happens to people who do leave the government.
> Very often, their salaries go up in the private sector. This is especially
> true for specialists like the folks who work at the NSA. Seems like they can
> hack it._

Well that's sort of tautological, isn't it? "The people who get a civilian job
are capable of getting a civilian job." These folks are in the "Patriot, not
inept" section of the diagram.

> _Firing has little to do with it._

Firing has a lot to do. I've spoken candidly about my colleagues here with
higher ups in the agency. They've openly bemoaned their inability to fire
_anyone_ , especially the people who they know for a fact do nothing all day.
Those people are soaking up hundreds of thousands, even millions a year, in
taxpayer dollars, doing little work of substance or value, and preventing
their positions from being filled by someone capable.

~~~
zip1234
Payroll is the number 1 expense for government agencies. Easier firing would
make a world of difference. I think the root cause is pensions. When people
are tied to pensions for a retirement, firing people becomes a much bigger
deal. Just pay a match into a retirement account and then when people can go,
they go. Private sector pensions are for the most part long gone. Why should
public sector keep them.

~~~
pc86
Pensions just don't make sense mathematically. If they're solvent based on the
state's investments, then the employee is getting a raw deal compared to
having just invested the money themselves. If they're not, then I as a
taxpayer am getting a raw deal by helping to pay for someone's retirement
because they worked for a state agency decades ago.

My state starts doling out pensions at 5 years. A friend of mine worked for a
state senator _in the 90s_ for 6 years. He's got something like $1200/mo
guaranteed during his retirement for 6 years of borderline political work ~25
years ago.

I know it's a politically charged subject but I don't see why from an
economic/mathematical perspective it's any better than moving the same
investments to the market. Or at least if you're going to keep the pensions,
only give them out for full service (20 years) like the military, _and_ make
it easier to fire a government worker for poor performance.

I shouldn't be able to sit on my thumbs for a few years and have my mortgage
covered by the taxpayers during my retirement.

~~~
dmm
Pensions make a lot of sense mathematically. If I personally fund my
retirement I have to save enough for the "worst" case scenario of living many
years longer than average. A pension on the other hand only has to invest
enough for the average lifespan because the person who dies a week before
retirement and collects nothing helps fund the person who lives to be 105.

State pensions are in trouble because govt pensions are allowed to assume
overly optimistic rates of return.

~~~
maoistinquisitr
If you're worried about living too long you can buy an annuity. It makes no
sense for employers or the government to make that choice for you.

~~~
majormajor
Mandatory safety net/insurance policies make sense because what we know from
experience is that if you don't have a mandated program, some people will blow
it off. And as long as we don't have the political will to let them die on the
street alone in poverty, it'll be very expensive to try pick up the pieces of
the mess once they hit the safety net. Especially if that's something like
hitting the ER needing tens of thousands of treatment to stabilize, before
just getting kicked back out to the street. Or wasting people's time in the ER
without medical need because the ER has heating and a bed and the cold winter
street doesn't.

Not everybody has family to fall back on in retirement, but we still don't
want to let them simply die. So the money has to be given somewhere.

~~~
hueving
You've gone a bit off the rail here because most people in the US don't get
pensions and we aren't forcing tons of people to die in the street.

I think you are confusing pensions with social security. Social security
already provides that bare minimum mandatory safety net.

~~~
pc86
Social Security is a pension (defined _benefit_ after a certain point as
opposed to defined contribution).

~~~
hueving
Ok, but nobody in the US calls it a pension so when you refer to a pension
everyone is assuming the one you got from an employer.

------
natch
There's a lot of blaming of external factors being injected into this
discussion. Namely, government pay scales, and the Trump factor.

But let's not forget the NSA's own self-inflicted wounds as well. Let's see,
here's what I remember:

* mission creep

* overreach

* LOVEINT

* massive collection of bulk intelligence with dubious justifications

* withholding information about 0 days it wanted to stockpile for its own use

* misleading technical committees so as to weaken encryption and security related standards

* introducing flawed security protocols

* paying money to security companies (RSA) to introduce weaknesses

* (thus with the above four items) actively sabotaging its own mission of helping to secure our nation's systems

* allowing its documents to be leaked en masse

* allowing possibly its most powerful and dangerous (though we don't know) sets of tools to be leaked as well.

Did I forget anything?

~~~
sillysaurus3
Yes, you forgot one thing:

* We need a powerful spy organization to compete on the world stage.

This is an unpopular truth that people in our circles tend to forget. Rome was
an influence solely due to the success of their military. What do you think
will happen when ours becomes ineffective?

And the NSA is a key part of our military. Intelligence is everything.

I think it's good the overreach was exposed, but I was worried about exactly
this outcome.

~~~
kodablah
> We need a powerful spy organization to compete on the world stage

I disagree or at least don't agree to the extent I might have in a more
embattled time (i.e. any time in the past). I do agree intelligence serves the
military well, I just don't agree with military intelligence scope growth at a
time when military use is shrinking. I'm not sure history repeats itself here
as much as perpetuates the justifications being used.

~~~
sillysaurus3
If you're interested in the subject, [https://www.amazon.com/100-Decisive-
Battles-Ancient-Present/...](https://www.amazon.com/100-Decisive-Battles-
Ancient-Present/dp/0195143663) is pretty fantastic.

"Anyone who clings to the historically untrue -- and thoroughly immoral --
doctrine that violence never settles anything I would advise to conjure up the
ghosts of Napoleon Bonaparte and the Duke of Wellington and let them debate
it. The ghost of Hitler would referee. Violence, naked force, has settled more
issues in history than has any other factor, and the contrary opinion is
wishful thinking at its worst. Breeds that forgot this basic truth have always
paid for it with their lives and their freedoms."

\- Robert Heinlein

This quote has always stuck with me, and I posted it here a couple years ago.
The reaction was almost universally negative. But after wising up a bit, I
think offensive ideas need to be faced squarely if we're to evolve as a
society.

I don't like it either. But I'd like it even less if it were a truth we
conceal, rather than a falsehood we suppress.

It's hard to tell. But one thing is certain: If you read 100 Decisive Battles,
you'll see the supremacy of intelligence in warfare. It matters more than any
other factor. And the NSA would be our key way to get it.

~~~
avh02
Personally I'd think that in more modern times, as close as we've been to wars
(e.g cold war times, which I'll admit predates me), there are probably
countless times where frantic phone calls and backroom diplomacy (importantly,
that you do not see) have saved everybody's skin from war (or nuclear war).

I'll admit, this is speculation, but I'd be seriously blown away if not true.

But yes, sometimes nations just have to battle it out. I'm just not one of
those people.

~~~
log_base_login
Both of the instances you mention would almost certainly rely or result on,
and from, what intelligence might be shared or derived from having that
frantic phone call or backroom diplomacy.

It's not just who you know, but what intel you can share to strengthen an
alliance that matters the most.

What troubles me about this article is the after effect on those who might be
employed by nation states who seek to better understand our intelligence
mechanism, and while I realize that every actor in the schema is a cog in a
very complex machine, it stands to reason that if tons of people are leaving
public service for the private sector, there is a vast amount of leaky intel
out there for the having.

I don't think there is anything wrong with consolidation, necessarily, but we
need to have stopgaps in place to quell the unwanted outflow of personnel from
what is essentially a defense-centered brain trust because of how much we as a
public have invested in their training and relied on them to help us stay out
of harm's way. I'm especially worried about the younger set (not to foment
discrimination, per se, but maturity does shape one's thinking) who may more
easily be duped by some seemingly friendly industry that is a shell company
for nefarious activity.

------
atonse
Not surprising. They’ve gone from having the perception of being the most
elite organization for hackers to more of what is described in Good Will
Hunting [1].

Perception is everything. I say this as someone who dreamt of working at the
NSA for most of my high school years, but would now never even consider it.

Edit: although I bet a lot of it is the 4x-5x salary jump you can get in cyber
security jobs by having the NSA on your resume. :-)

[1]
[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mJHvSp9AKYg](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mJHvSp9AKYg)

~~~
auntienomen
I think it's become pretty clear recently -- looking at what Snowden leaked
and at the trouble the Iranians had with their centrifuges or at the way Comey
knew that Sessions was going to recuse himself -- that the NSA _is_ the most
elite organization for hackers/crackers. It's hard to be certain from the
outside, of course, but when I look at what Henninger et al have written about
what they're doing... well, it's a breath-taking technical achievement

As for perception: These technologies exist, and it's up to us to make sure
that they're used wisely. Right now, the institutions of the US and allied
governments are the caretakers and safeguards. They're not perfect, but I'll
take them over the competition every day of the week.

~~~
Eridrus
The NSA leaks we're at once impressive in their technical scope, but largely
just things we knew we're possible if you threw engineers at the problem.

It's likely we didn't get the really juicy bits, but the vast majority of the
stuff we learnt about was just operationalizing things we already knew.to be
possible.

------
nimbius
Speaking from experience, I applied to the NSA a few years ago and its surreal
how unrealistic the expectations were.

a major problem with NSA employment is the mandatory 5 year contractor like
status period with half-pay. the NSA expects seasoned professionals from the
private sector to join its ranks with a 33k salary? get real. The agency also
prides itself on an almost obscene reliance on Polygraphs, a technology no
more accurate or scientifically sound than a babushka shuffling chicken bones
and reading tea leaves.

I also wasnt exactly blown away by the interview questions. my technical
screening for a Linux position came from former members of the military, who
grilled me on 2 unix questions before asking if they could switch to windows,
confessing they 'didnt know much linux.'

~~~
jessriedel
> The agency also prides itself on an almost obscene reliance on Polygraphs, a
> technology no more accurate or scientifically sound than a babushka
> shuffling chicken bones and reading tea leaves.

I can't find out why I see smart people repeating this all the time. It's not
true. Polygraphs are very flawed, and they are especially vulnerable to
preparatory countermeasures, but they have non-trivial predictive power.

When I ask people to justify their dismissal of polygraphs, they generally
point to the fact that they are not allowed in court, but this is a terrible
reason. Hearsay isn't allowed in court either but that doesn't mean it isn't
useful.

~~~
dclowd9901
If it doesn't stand up to "beyond a reasonable doubt" how can you have such
faith in it? Hearsay is a fine example, as I wouldn't want my innocence
predicated upon someone's flawed memory or whim.

~~~
jessriedel
Because "beyond a reasonable doubt" is a much higher level of certainty than
we have for making many decisions in life? The NSA isn't jailing people based
on a lie-detector, they are just using it as a necessary but not sufficient
criteria for granting security access. It's OK to deny such access based on
weak or circumstantial evidence.

------
mabbo
When I was just about to graduate from University, I had an offer from Amazon
on the way (yay internships) but not really in-hand yet, so I kept
interviewing. One of the options was CSEC, Canada's NSA.

The stark reality was that at Amazon, in 2 or 3 years I would be making double
what CSEC was offering. Early career pay in one was end-career pay in the
other. They seemed nice, and I suppose what they were doing felt _important_ ,
but the money was simply too good to turn down. (No regrets either- I worry if
I'd gone with them, I might have wound up living in Russia with a roommate
named Ed.)

~~~
pm90
It worked better for you and I'm glad to hear that. For some people, the
stability of a Govt. job, the regularity of promotions, the lack of long term
uncertainty and perhaps the absence of as high expectations makes it
worthwhile to pursue a job that pays less.

~~~
mabbo
Actually, this stability and security was another big reason I chose _not_ to
join Government. I had done a few internships in the public service, and what
I saw horrified me.

When _you_ have job security and low expectations placed on you, it's
wonderful. When _everyone_ does, it's horrible. There is relatively little
room for the lazy and useless in the private sector.

~~~
pm90
Again, I ask that you refrain from characterizing everyone as lazy and
useless. I know a lot of women friends who choose to join Government service
because of its long term stability which is important for them as they raise a
family. They are some of the hardest working and smartest people I know.

Sure bad apples are harder to eliminate, but that doesn't mean everyone is
bad.

~~~
mabbo
I agree that my choice of words implies everyone is- and that is not true.

What I saw in government was a lot of dead weight adding little value and
taking home paychecks, being carried by a small group of people working their
asses off to keep everything afloat. The dead weight couldn't be fired short
of them doing something crazy, like sneaking into the office over the weekend
and drinking half the wine set aside for the Christmas party (so the story
went of the only guy who got fired from that office). The heavy lifters felt
unable to even take a vacation because they know nothing would get done if
they left- example, a boss I had who wasn't sure she could go to her sister's
wedding in Jamaica for two weeks because the office wouldn't manage without
her.

My own wife is an engineer in municipal government. She's a superhero as far
as I can tell. The dead weight on her team can't be fired, and she does many
times the work they do for a smaller salary- they've been here longer, you
see, so they make more money.

Perhaps my perspective on public sector jobs is skewed, but I've yet to hear a
compelling reason I would want to have one.

------
dimva
This is a problem across all of government. As a mediocre senior software
engineer with no reports, I was paid more last year than the goddamn President
of the United States (and no, it's not because I got lucky with stock). This
is completely stupid and unacceptable.

Of course our choices are going to be Hillary vs Trump if we pay the top
leader in the country less than a mediocre software engineer. Of course
Hillary will give secret speeches to Wall St firms - how else is she going to
pay her bills? Of course the government is going to be incompetent and corrupt
- we can't hire good people at the salaries we're paying unless they use their
influence to obtain side gigs in the private sector (often after their
service, but that means they won't do anything to annoy their future bosses).

Why does Sundar Pichai make 500x more than the President? Do we, as a society,
value running Google well 500x more than running our government well?

Government salaries need to be raised significantly (2-500x) across the board,
or the government will continue being the mess it is now.

~~~
millstone
Presidential pay is not outrageous because those seeking the Presidency should
be motivated by public service, not remuneration.

Of course, the President doesn't really have bills. He or she doesn't exactly
pay to rent the White House.

~~~
patosai
It's true that public service is a major part, but another way of thinking
about it is if government officials are highly paid, they are less likely to
be bribed or act in their own financial self interest and more motivated by
what is good for the country. Plus it attracts talent.

Singapore is an extreme example of this (perhaps too extreme) - the Prime
Minister earns over $1.5M a year.

~~~
myaso
This Singapore comment needs to die before someone else ever repeats it again.
Lee Hsien Loong (2004-now) is the son of Lee Kuan Yew (1965-1990) --
compensation has nothing to do with it in this case. Past a certain
compensation range you are selecting for greed and nothing else -- if you earn
in the top 10% and can't make do I seriously doubt you are 'intelligent' or
your children must eat a lot and you have my sympathies.

------
candiodari
> The brain drain has been so pronounced that at one gathering in 2016 of the
> agency’s elite hacking division, one individual raised the concern with
> Rogers directly. According to several people familiar with the exchange,
> Rogers disputed that there was any increase in attrition and told his
> employees that they should stop complaining and get back to work.

Remember this. As someone who started their professional life in 2000, lived
through 2009, and went through a multinational's "reorg" (mass-firing by
geography, several 10s of thousands of people), let me tell you :

As soon as you notice there is general discontent, and people no longer care
enough about their jobs to ask questions like this to the top brass, it is
time to make sure you have another job lined up. You can get better jobs this
way, and the hammer will come down.

Above all, know that this Rogers guy is fairly honest. And yet, he directly
contradicts the Washington Post. He's an exec, and he has ONE job : do exactly
what his superiors say without bother them.

He (once for me it was a she) will NOT give you any piece of information you
do not already have. They are there to get people to work together.

By "motivating".

By lying.

By cheating.

This means that when it comes to the health of the company and your future job
prospects, a sober chat with the cleaning staff will yield more useful
information than an hour long "fireside chat" with a highly placed manager.
Not because they know a lot, but simply because they don't lie, and they know
a little. An executive is not talking to you, except in the way a vet is
talking to stray dogs at the impound. They don't respect you, they can't do
anything for you, they don't like you ... and they're very, very good at
hiding this (just look at financial presentations on youtube, say of the IBM
CEO, knowing that she has for years, every 2 months or so, fired 1000+ people,
with the constant online reports of them getting cheated out of severance.
Listen to her, then think about the kind of person who does that. You half
expect to get free candy and a hug every 2 minutes or so when listening to
her. Or listen to Clinton talking, knowing that he's the sort of man that
threatens women to have sex with him. Think about what those people he talks
to really mean to him)

~~~
itronitron
I feel like many organizations, of which NSA is one example, make the mistake
of putting technical program leads in charge of people. Leading people and
motivating them to do their best work together requires a different skill set,
and Rogers' response to the vocalized attrition concern suggests that he isn't
capable of keeping people in the organization. I appreciate that he took time
to talk with staff and take questions but he needs to become a better
listener, or in other words ... work on his signals intelligence.

~~~
candiodari
You misunderstood my post. No he doesn't need to listen. In fact, listening is
the quickest way for him to lose his job. The fact that you even say this
means you partially believe him, and that's a mistake on your part. The only
signals intelligence this guy needs or wants is listening to his superiors,
and his job is one-way data transmission from his boss to the rank and file.
STRICTLY one-way (and trust me, it doesn't matter if his boss is Trump or
Obama).

Of course he "talks" with staff and takes questions. Why ? Because despite his
wages, he is not all that good at correctly transmitting information, so he is
doing this so he might do his job better by having his team interpret his
ideas, and try to clarify them to him by asking questions. This is done mostly
to avoid the worst of screwups. Only questions that follow this pattern get
answered, or even seriously considered (check those financial videos again,
trust me you'll see this happen).

He does not have an opinion (I mean he does, but none that you'll ever hear).
Remember that. You cannot ask him for it, you will never get an answer. And
when you do, because there are amounts of alcohol that will make him divulge
opinions, please don't start destroying careers (mostly your own, but you may
drag others down) by telling other people what those opinions are.

He won't care about attrition until the ability of the organisation to carry
out his boss's orders is in danger, or when his boss cares. Nothing other than
that can make him care. But he's paid a LOT of money to make you think he
cares.

~~~
itronitron
Well, I agree with you about the one-way transmission. My point about
listening is that I expect that a lot of their technical capability is
initially developed through individual/team interest and not top-down
direction so in the interest of advancing the organization's operational
capabilities management should support two-way communication.

------
acdha
This combines a long running problem in government – not being allowed to
offer competitive salaries for high-demand skills — with the new presidential
administration’s chaos, and the specific feeling that the agency is not a
force for good. I feel bad for everyone trying to do their jobs but struggling
under the weight of so much baggage.

~~~
wybiral
> the specific feeling that the agency is not a force for good.

There are a mixture of feelings about the agency. The same can be said of the
CIA and FBI. And this is nothing new.

~~~
acdha
Not new but accentuated: I think a lot of people used to know there was some
gray area but thought we were generally on the right side (not unlike the U.S.
attitude about torture until the Bush-era reversal), before the pattern of
relentless disregard for the law and American interests really went public.

A lot more people are comfortable with, say, targeted foreign attacks than
broad domestic dragnets or attacking American companies or standards.

~~~
wybiral
> relentless disregard for the law and American interests really went public

Are you talking about metadata collection?

------
throwaway19372
Disclaimer: I work for the federal government, but my thoughts are my own.

From what I have seen, there are a mix of issues that cause this: \- It takes
a long time to hire someone (usually 2-3 months), and if they need a
clearance, the process is even longer (some clearances can take easily over a
year now, and that person cannot do any work until they have them). \- A lot
of people want to go into these organizations to do cool things, but then find
out they have a lot of additional duties they do not wish to do. \- Government
salaries are capped, and it is very difficult to fire a government civilian.

The issue of taking a long time to hire someone means that if someone leaves,
their job does not go away. So their duties have to go somewhere, usually on
someone else, and that will take a minimum of 3 months if you hire someone off
the street. If the job requires a clearance, you now are waiting over a year
if the person did not have the right clearance (while the person sits on that
spot, so you can't hire anyone else if they come up).

From what I have seen, most people hired off of the streets are from
college/grad school, and they are excited to do technical work. However, since
the government caps civilian salaries, they will frequently contract out
technical work (so they can hire the very expensive technical personnel). This
means most of the technical work is done by contractors. Civilians more often
than not oversee the contractors doing the technical work. If you have a
technically inclined government civilian, then those contractors frequently
snatch them up.

So now you have a compounding problem of it is difficult to hire/keep
technical people, and the work they do is more and more non-technical, as most
of the work to oversee contractors is what is called an "inherently
governmental function", so those have to be done by a government person. This
is a negative feedback loop that really hurts keeping these types of technical
people.

------
throwitfarfar
NSA is in the middle of a bozo explosion. It's hard to keep good people when
they have to deal with so many bozos.

To give you an example, there was a reorg a few years ago to outsource NSA's
IT. (Makes a lot of sense that an agency that pretty much only does IT would
outsource IT, right?)

In the reorg, 500+ people were identified as having no discernible skill that
was relevant to the mission. They were segregated into their own org and given
busy work. When the outsourcing occurred, the contractor was incentivized to
employ and retain them for 2 years, including the 500+. To entice them, they
paid them above their government salary.

The contractor could not figure out what to do with them either. It treated
them as "casual employees". They were given a salary, but did not have to
report to work and had no responsibilities. For 2 years.

Once the incentive ran out, these folks went back to NSA and got rehired as
government employees. According to the hiring rules, they went right to the
top of the stack.

------
solarkraft
> The people who have left were responsible for collecting and analyzing the
> intelligence that goes into the president’s daily briefing

Cool, because the demand is gone too.

~~~
erikb
Exactly, right? Maybe they are not even angry about losing the analysts.

------
iokevins
The State of California recently initiated a reclassification project for IT
positions, which includes evaluating salaries. They last reclassified
positions in 1976...back when Elvis was alive (note: salaries have risen
modestly since that time, thankfully).

------
Tyrannosaur
Might it also be because of the cost of overcoming their conscience? I
understand that there are multiple groups in the NSA that do things other than
illegal surveillance and hacking, but I would have an even higher price than
other companies' offers I would require in exchange for my moral values if the
NSA ever offered me any position at all...

~~~
itronitron
still less than the cost of someone overcoming their conscience for working at
Facebook

~~~
RepressedEmu
Only on HN can you find people who think the NSA is worse than Facebook.

------
jcoffland
Government work also suffers from over regulation. A friend of mine who works
for a major defense contractor as an electrical engineer is literally not
allowed to use a screwdriver driver. He must requisition a union worker for
jobs involving a screwdriver. This takes tons of time and the simple job may
ultimately never get done. In practice, he and his colleagues wait until after
5pm, when the union guys have gone, to use screwdrivers.

I told this story to my Uncle who worked for 30 years at a national lab. He
said they had a similar problem and solution for using a broom to sweep up a
mess in their work area. These stories sound unbelievable but I believe they
are common and that situations like this regularly cripple and demoralize
government work.

~~~
Danihan
And this is why government projects are essentially doomed to fail versus
capitalism, in the long-view.

------
bgentry
_Rogers disputed that there was any increase in attrition and told his
employees that they should stop complaining and get back to work._

Can’t imagine why anybody would want to leave.

------
ENOTTY
By way of comparison, GCHQ personnel seem to be leaving for 4-5x salary from
big tech companies[1]. So do the math and figure out what the GCHQ folks are
being paid.

Also, GCHQ has hired 494 contractors for 71m GBP[2].

[1]:
[https://sites.google.com/a/independent.gov.uk/isc/files/2016...](https://sites.google.com/a/independent.gov.uk/isc/files/2016-2017_ISC_AR.pdf?attredirects=1),
page 40

[2]: Ibid, page 70

~~~
sofaofthedamned
I live in Cheltenham and pre-Snowden may have entertained the idea for working
there. I tracked a job they were advertising for nearly a year - they were
offering ~32k for a Linux expert with years of experience. Good luck on that
one. I think they eventually converted it to a contract role, but even then I
wouldn't entertain it.

Another friend worked at the big James Bond building in London, was regularly
taken around the world at short notice to do security things, and was on less
than 40k. He loved that job more than anything in the world but literally
couldn't afford to live there so went contracting for 5x the money. Apparently
in the government a large part of salary reviews is based on (age +
seniority), so you're waiting a long time for a decent uplift that may never
arrive.

~~~
ENOTTY
Just to be clear, your amounts are in GBP right?

~~~
sofaofthedamned
Yup.

------
scarmig
Question: how does this compare to other states?

I'm particularly interested in China's equivalent(s?) of the NSA. Do they
manage to retain talent? Is it because the PRC's elite believes more in its
mission? Is it higher status than the NSA? Do they offer higher relative
salaries?

~~~
gervase
I think the best we can do is speculate on this, as China's cyber capabilities
are still relatively unknown by the public [0]. However, based on their
investment in academics and a generally more positive view of government jobs
in general (possibly due to historic sociocultural contexts [1]), I believe
it's likely that their equivalent groups are probably treated quite well.

For example, for successful US-trained Chinese researchers, the Chinese
government offers generous funding, publication bonuses [2], and high pay
(comparable to, or better than, US institutions) for those who are willing to
return to China and run research labs there.

Additionally, due to the relative lack of commercial opportunities for talent,
creative, and ambitious home-grown talent (vs the opportunities in the US
available to similar US-trained talent), the bar the government must exceed is
commensurately lower.

0\.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PLA_Unit_61398](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PLA_Unit_61398)

1\.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_examination](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_examination)

2\. [http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/08/cash-bonuses-peer-
rev...](http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/08/cash-bonuses-peer-reviewed-
papers-go-global)

------
0xBA5ED
Wouldn't worry too much. If they're heading to SV, their talents may still
benefit the NSA.

~~~
nraynaud
Those fine people who have shown such a good jugement in choosing their
previous job will be perfectly fine managing my google history and the cookies
in my browser, I’m really looking forwards to it.

I’m really curious if they’ll have the power to get more people killed at
google or at the NSA.

------
TallGuyShort
I'll never forget talking to an NSA recruiter (cybersecurity expert doing a
recruiting assignment, not a full-time recruiter) at a university job fair. I
asked if he felt like he was really spending most of his time protecting
people or if a lot of it was political agenda and budget protection, etc. His
answer was, "well, it's not _all_ politics..." Thank you, recruiter, for
making that career choice a supremely easy one.

------
mooneater
Might expect this to ultimately lead to privatization of these services. Which
is black mirror territory.

------
ocschwar
The top talent might be leaving, but the databases and the lovely toys are
staying put.

To be used by not-top-talent.

Interesting times.

------
tequila_shot
Honest question: What's the skillset of a hacker at NSA? Not that I'm
targeting to become one, just curious as to how someone would become a hacker.

------
paulie_a
Why work for the NSA when you can overcharge Being a contractor for an equally
inept organization

------
jwatte
The NSA needs educated smart people. The president has denigrated education
and smart people. NSA employees work for the president. Reap what you sow.

~~~
erikb
With the speed of development in government organisation one could wonder if
the current fallout is Trump's fault or Bush's faulth, though.

~~~
zeveb
I think that you're missing someone in between Mr. Bush & President Trump …

~~~
erikb
I think I leave him out on purpose.

------
naveen99
Or maybe anyone who understands cryptography enough to work at the NSA,
understands bitcoin and blockchains enough to realize they can make a lot more
money for a lot less effort in cryptocurrencies. Same with machine learning.
The crypto bubble goes beyond money, it goes to creativity and brain drain
from the rest of the economy.

~~~
gozur88
Plus security. It's always been a skill in relatively high demand, but in the
last ten years or so companies have been willing to pay whatever it takes to
avoid getting hacked. My company brought in all sorts of consultants just
after, coincidentally I'm sure, the Target CEO lost his job because of a hack.

------
bryanrasmussen
Actually I remember reading at some point that the people who have the best
careers in tech move between government and private at the right times, when
there is going to be a downturn in the economy they move into the security of
government work and work on the rules and regulations that will govern the
future, as the economy turns back up they move into consulting regarding those
particular rules and regulations.

This actually points to one of my major career mistakes in that when I left my
government job I was burned out on the standard I had just spent some years
seeing through to law, and instead of working consulting on it I took a
totally unrelated job (based on the enticements of a friend who promised we
would get to work on something I really wanted to work on)

I left millions on the table just by that one stupid decision. but then again
I was really burned out on it.

on edit: improved formatting

------
bariswheel
This is not a good thing at all. This will lead to a shittier NSA and with
their power, this is a lousy combination,

------
RogueIMP
This isn't just NSA, but tech positions GOV wide. Lots of locations are
requiring Contractors be put on an equivalent pay scale as the GOV employees,
causing them both to look elsewhere... Why take a position with less stability
and benefits, for the same, and in some cases less, pay.

------
danielovichdk
I wonder if there is also some people morale in this. I mean, if I was a
hacker and knew what the NSA had been up to in regards of mass-surveilance, my
integrity and morale would be like "heck no, thies org' fucked up and I want
nothing to do with them, at all!".

------
dvradrebel
A lot of EU security experts (UK included) take time off to make extra money
through companies like ours - senseiclub.com - to train corporate in anything
from ethical hacking to certified GDPR compliance - they can't be making much
at their regular jobs.

Some even register their own company - which makes sense - as freelancing full
time, end of the day, is possible. Make your own schedule, decline to go to
work, take a month off - it's good fun. We got some people booked for over 110
days out of 250 for 2018 already.

As for pensions and savings - folks go to wealth managers.

Hit me up if you want some really good training courses for your company or
your buddy is looking for extra gigs (GCHQ folks are welcome).

Think productschool.com for cyber security, compliance, cloud and data.

Cheerio

------
meri_dian
Seems like we should redirect some of the funding the traditional military
branches get to the NSA. The work they do is more relevant and important than
ever before, and it doesn't look like we're going to have a hot war any time
soon.

------
jancsika
I'd suggest separating these anonymous complaints into those which at least
have boolean choices and those which have unary choices.

 _Reorganization of dept. has created red tape._ Ok, that seems like one of
many opinions a source at the NSA could have.

 _Snowden hurt our agency and made our jobs more difficult._ I'm not sure that
an NSA source could have any other opinions on this matter, especially given
that a) I've never read anyone who currently works at the NSA call Snowden
anything but a traitor and b) the NSA certainly knows the identity of the
sources for this story. I think we have to reject such complaints as facile.

------
pjc50
Another view: [http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/12/who-is-
reality-...](http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/12/who-is-reality-
winner.html)

That was circulated with the comment "the risk is not so much people running
to the Russians as people running to civil society - the NSA is not as popular
as they think."

The NSA, like much of the US system, demands absolute unconditional loyalty.
Internal dissent is not possible. Taking dissent public will get you sent to
prison where you're not allowed to speak to journalists.

~~~
erikb
replace prison with getting fired and you have the same in the industry.

~~~
pm90
Clearly you've never been to prison.

~~~
erikb
Clearly the point is not the comparison between the impact of both experiences
on the receiving end.

------
andy_ppp
I read somewhere that 70% of US intelligence spending these days was on
private contracting companies anyway. I guess if you’re good you'll end up at
one of them?

------
zaro
Finally some good news from NSA.

------
candiodari
> the nation’s 17 spy agencies.

17.

WTF.

~~~
ENOTTY
From Wikipedia[1]: CIA, NSA/CSS, NRO, DIA, NGA, intelligence elements of the
five armed forces (Air Force, Army, Navy, Marines, and Coast Guard), and
intelligence elements of the State Department, Department of Energy, DHS,
Treasury, DEA, FBI, and finally overseeing them all, ODNI.

Each specializes in collecting a different kind of intelligence or in a
different focus for analysis.

[1]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Intelligence_Com...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Intelligence_Community)

~~~
yters
Why do the DoE and Treasury need intelligence elements?

~~~
foxhound6
DoE handles the nuclear arsenal. Treasury contains the Secret Service.

------
boysabr3
Related: [https://www.recode.net/2017/5/8/15557846/stripe-peiter-
mudge...](https://www.recode.net/2017/5/8/15557846/stripe-peiter-mudge-zatko-
jon-kaltwasser-security-hire)

------
rdl
I remember predicting this back when the Snowden first leaked, and someone
popular on HN saying it wouldn't happen. I suspect the reorg and general
politics outside NSA have had a bigger impact than "oh, spying is wrong" in
popular culture, though.

------
stackreality
In this case, an inevitable outcome is likely the privatization of more of
these industries. Let companies like Palantir take over the job and ensure we
have some solid regulations to ensure Thiel can't read our emails.

------
_zachs
I've got an idea, stop giving Congress free health care and stop giving
Congress a $100k a year pension after they've resigned. Bam, there's your
competitive salary to offer NSA engineers.

~~~
forgotmysn
wow thank you so much for your brilliant solution. considering that both of
those require Congress to accomplish, do you have another brilliant idea for
getting them to do it?

------
zeep
Now they really won't be able to analyze all that data...

------
kalop
They end up going to private corporations like Booz Allen, then the government
ends up contracting these companies in the private sector lol.

------
tanilama
Consider it has such bad reputation and public image, and subpar salary this
is not surprising at all.

------
kgc
The salary cap sounds like it will lead to more outsourcing, which would
increase expenses overall.

------
k__
They probably hoped, if they work long enough for the man, they'll become the
man.

------
peter_retief
I would love to work for them, creative interesting projects with funding,
pick me!

------
known
What's wrong in leaving when somebody is paying better?

------
jhiska
>If the NSA is going to spy on us, wouldn't you like that to be as secure as
possible?

I'd rather those perverts not peep on us; this isn't an unreasonable request.

------
angel_j
Don't hire these people!

------
nathanvanfleet
Good?

------
cryoshon
with luck, mentioning NSA on your resume results in an immediate trip to the
discard pile during applications at most tech companies.

if you're going to invade privacy on a massive scale, you better be ready for
the consequences.

~~~
659087
> if you're going to invade privacy on a massive scale, you better be ready
> for the consequences.

Like a job at Google/Facebook, where you'll continue invading privacy on a
massive scale?

~~~
dqpb
I like Google and Facebook. They provide a lot of value to a lot of people,
invest in R&D, and contribute to the open source community.

I've seen an uptick of negativity on HN lately, especially targeted at the big
SV companies. Not intelligent criticism mind you, just basic trolling. For
example your account appears to be 99% dedicated to shitting on SV companies.

~~~
crispinb
> Google and Facebook .. provide a lot of value to a lot of people, invest in
> R&D, and contribute to the open source community.

VS

> Facebook is attempting to kill all open communication protocols and force
> everyone to communicate through their platform with powerful network
> effects.

There's no contradiction here. Both can be true at the same time. Large
organisations (government & commercial alike) have even less of a fixed &
permanent nature than do individuals, and can carry out huge numbers of
activities in parallel, some harmful, some beneficial.

You can try some sort of rough consequentialist calculus on an organisation's
overall benefits / harms to society, which is complex and subjective to an
extent that gives almost completely free play to prejudice.

Alternatively you can look at the systems within which organisations grow and
assess the functioning of the whole thing. I think this is the more powerful
approach, having more potential for sidelining empty moralising. Personally I
believe that for fundamental reasons, hypergrowth-oriented technological
society inevitably leads to the destruction of everything of value (in truth a
subject for a book, not a forum comment). Facebook & Google are natural &
unwitting agents of these fundamental forces. At the same time, decent &
capable humans work for them in large numbers, so inevitably make positive
countervailing contributions.

------
Jd
I'm hiring ;)

~~~
erikb
And who are you? Working for a hospital or something?
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8gaoEQqoA8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8gaoEQqoA8)

Your website can't be reached btw.

~~~
Jd
I work on and advise several projects involving protection and cyber-security,
specifically within the blockchain space.

------
Feniks
This is happening across the US government as a whole. The US State department
is dead for instance.

When you have talent and options why stay with a creaky ship that's sailing
straight into a hurricane with a mad captain at the helm?

------
yuhong
My favorite is that the more the FBI/NSA spends, the more government debt get
printed. You may know that the government shutdown is because of a debt
ceiling.

------
z0ltan
LOL.

------
craftyguy
good.

------
0xADADA
Tis article reeks of Executive Branch propaganda from anonymous sources
"according to current and former U.S. officials" etc etc

------
alexnewman
Been the story since George bush. I wonder if they would have acted narrowly
within the law if they would have had better org

------
DannyB2
> The people who have left were responsible for collecting

> and analyzing the intelligence that goes into the

> president’s daily briefing.

I seem to recall that the president's daily briefing is now a single page with
pictures. How many people does it take to produce that?

~~~
ixtli
Why is this getting down voted?

------
genzoman
the CIA funded Washington Post sullying the good name of those noble domestic
spying NSA'ers?

Faker News

~~~
dang
Would you please stop posting unsubstantive comments here?

~~~
acct1771
The only real problem I see is a lack of elaboration on some of the important
little-known politics at play, here.

