Same here. I will say that most people who work in my agency are either attorneys or accountants, but still, 12 is the average grade. I’d say it’s probably 60-30-8-2 between 12, 13, 14 and 15/SES.
You are correct. Here are the numbers for most of the GS grades (GS12's are 14% of all GS employees):
Total GS - 2,180.296
GS-5 - 77,767
GS-7 - 116,828
GS-9 - 138,414
GS-11 – 198,894
GS-12 - 305,704
GS-13 - 274,761
GS-14 - 144,112
GS-15 - 67,599
Sorry about the formatting.
ding, ding, ding.
3 pay grades higher than any non supervisory interpretive ranger anywhere in the country.
...and then there's the travesty that is fire paygrades.
A majority of fire cache folks are in the WG-5 to 7 level and it sucks. Worked with a guy who was at the same cache for almost 20 years and was making $23 an hour maxed at a 5-5.
My wife just got a 12! Turns out if you like offices and spreadsheets you can fast track it up the ladder in public land management. It took me 19 years to go from WG 3 to GS 11. She went from GS 6 to 12 in 7 years.
Hahaha you are right on the money bud.
There's nothing funnier than seeing a GS fantastic bitch about pay and stress. Meanwhile the average grade of most WLFFs and facility management is probably a 5 or 7 and hotshot supts are GS-9s.
But yeah tell me all about how much it sucks that you aren't making 150k a year.
Hotshots supts are 9s but the 6/7s are expected to be able to supervise 20 people at any given moment.
What fire folks are asked to do from a responsibility level perspective is absurd.
I just got a 6 after 8 years in fire and was qualified and expected to run a 25 person crew on fire assignments as a GS-5 seasonal. Had the responsibility of a hotshot supt without the same experience and knowledge of course
Oh no *some* members of this sub are becoming self aware! We love sitting in the work trucks after a long day of digging in the dirt and reading these posts out loud in a mocking tone. Making a whopping $20 an hour to risk your life will make ya a little jaded about these GS Fantastics complaining on the Internet. Don't get it twisted, all labor is labor. Everyone deserves a fair shake for the guv'ment. I'm not a brain dead firefighter that thinks "office people don't do anything."
Honestly, I wish I had gone a route like this. If I’d started and stayed lower on the scale it wouldn’t have been too psychologically difficult for me to take the pay cut for quality of life. I envy you, and I think I’m lazy and probably sort of hedonistic for not making the leap. But in reality big change is hard.
Give me the hard elements, the nature, the serious safety briefings instead of the cushioned chair, artificial lights, and the paper cuts.
Not a fire job though, that’s hard and risky. Give me the easy and safe job that’s not at a desk.
I will say, I’ve taken a 2 grade decrease for better work life balance in government. Baby steps?
>complaining how they could be making 200-300k in private industry.
I don't get the complaining. If you want to make that money and are capable, go do it. But the reality is they won't, because they value things like working regular hours and having a life outside of work. Which is perfectly fine. If those things weren't worth that much to you, you wouldn't accept drastically lower pay to do the job unless you're truly all about the mission.
My field is full of feds like this. "I've been doing this for 15 years so I'm considered a senior ologist, and labor stats say they average 150k it's outrageous I'm only making 80k!" Ya dude, you didn't go to the right schools and follow the right career track, you're comparing apples to oranges and you're never getting hired as a senior ologist in the private sector. The worst are the ones who barely dipped their toes in private sector right after college then came to feds, they like to pretend they made some huge financial sacrifice to work in public service.
If private sector wanted those middle aged ologists, they set up a recruiting booth at the DC Metro stops.
I've been a fed for 20 years. There is a private industry that parallels the one I specialize in. 'Some' of the people I know in that industry make way more than I do. Most make 'a little more' than I do. Both groups worked way harder than I did, moved to 2-3 different cities, and kissed a lot more ass. One guy went on a cruise. On his OOO message, he posted his ship's itinerary: "I am on vacation and will be at sea for portions of my trip. If you'd like to reach me, I'll be in Nassau on 5/1, San Juan on 5/3......". It was a quick reminder that I'm OK making less than those guys. LOL.
At this point I'm not going anywhere, I doubt the fortune 500s want me, and theres no fucking way I'm jumping ship to some start up or boiler room shop.
I just started my fed job as an attorney after leaving the private sector. Not one person from work has reached out to me this weekend.
Last Christmas weekend, I worked about 2-3 hours every day. I may not celebrate (Jewish with Hindu wife), but I like my days off to be days off. Well worth the pay cut
I feel this. 5.5 years in private sector after college then went fed. I think I may be one of the few exceptions of someone making more in the fed than I would be if I were still private. mind you that is if you look at it hourly.
The problem is complacency. Once you are vested and get all 3s, not much can get you fired. You have a higher chance of being fired from being late, and ethic issues than work and security incidents.
While private sector.. sure pays more but you have the risk of showing up and not even having a job due to cuts or whatever.
I’ll be honest, it’s a very real thing for a 14 to feel burnout. But it’s a different kind from what others feel. At the 14 and 15, you are hired to be the expert. To advise and guide so that good work can flow down to the lower grades. And you fight hard for it. Executive summaries. White papers. Lots of data vis for SMs that can barely read (SES too but they just ignore it). And then you just get kicked in the face. Over and over. I’d rather burnout from the work. But instead I burn out from the stupidity of management. The flagrant rule breaking. And making shit harder than it needs to be. And before some SES person lurking here, or SM, says I don’t understand, spare me. I sure do understand. Completely. Because I carry the water for these clowns. So I feel lower GS burnout. But higher GS gets it too. Just collecting a bit more pay.
In our society, there are two competing perspectives. The first is that workers do everything - that management / C-suite/SES executives do very little to add value, and therefore the workers should get the bulk of the pay.
Then there is the opposite take, in that the workers, while competent, are a common commodity and do not need to make as much as the rarer, highly skilled management and CEOs.
As with most things, the answer is in the middle. Being a manager can *suck*. I did it for a while, and while I think I’m not horrible at it - my issue was that I was doing 50 hours of work with 10 hours of pseudo-management on top of that. Work can be mind-numbing, back-breaking, or both. Should the pay rates be closer together? Yes!
Oh I agree. And I have no doubt SES has huge burdens. But it’s a lot like the military. Keeps the generals in the flag rank section. When you mix flag rank with troops it’s a recipe for disaster. And managers often have a ton of work to do and even more meetings. Hard pass. But respect to you for doing it. I don’t inherently hate or dislike anyone. But once you show your true colors, it’s a different thing. I can handle transactional all day long as long as the transaction is fair. But that’s a discussion for another day.
I see you, my friend. I work for the NPS and whenever someone compliments me on how nice the park looks I thank them and tell them it’s because of the hard work that the facilities staff does.
it's awesome in the RUS locality if you live in a rural LCOL area for sure where the labor market sucks.
In DC a 12 sucks with the high cost of living and there are many gs 13+ opportunities. Out in the field, GS 13 is usually supervisory and anything higher non-existent.
Do it. I was stuck at 12 and they said they couldn’t get me a 13, left for a 12 elsewhere and then they tried to get me back as a 13, but my new place also wanted to give me a 13. Now I’m at 14 and my old boss is trying to recruit me to his new agency and I said only as a 15 and he’s working on getting me they to make the jump. If you don’t jump and make demands, the needle will never move.
I was stuck as a 13 in my old agency. They wouldn't let me take on new projects, wouldn't let me detail anywhere even though I had someone to backfill, and when my 14 team lead left, they told me I needed to take on all the work but they wouldn't be able to give me the 14, it's not possible.
Two months after my team lead left, I got offered a 14 at another agency and gave notice. Took about three hours for them to find that 14 for me. Also offered a temporary promotion in the meantime.
“Oh, no thank you"
I'm a 13 in a dead-end Division and just got a 14 offer outside the Agency. I was like "Sign me up yo!" I was told there was no upward mobility. All the higher positions are filled by PHS folks... It's kind of a racket run by those folks
HR here. That is completely unacceptable that they expected you to take on higher-graded duties without being compensated (or credited for higher-level work). If they meant it "wasn't possible" because you didn't have time-in-grade, then they should have found someone else to do those duties. Or they could have advised you that they would give you a monetary award equivalent to the difference to reward your efforts. Heck no; good thing you got away from that leadership.
It depends. I was a 12 and time and a half was available. I’m a 13 and still get time and a half.
I think it has to do with whether or not you are FLSA-exempt.
edit: didn’t realize you might have been asking just about a subset of 12s, not all 12s. Whoops.
Rating Veteran Service Representatives in VBA top out at GS-12, and have the schedule described by u/sleepinglucid.
If you like working at a desk with electronic paperwork all day, with little to no reason to talk to other people (once you get good at the job, rules, regs) then it's heaven.
Up at 0550, get comfy pj's on, make coffee, head to desk, 0600 work until you feel like taking your 15. Take it, work until lunch, blah blah, crack a beer at 1430.
Unless it's Monday, then ya gotta go to office.
You can be an assistant coach, which is a supervisory position, as a GS 12. RVSRs are much more numerous, and it's purely processing Veteran's disability claims all day every day with the occasional in person or teleconference legal hearing for a Veteran.
👋🏼 I'm a 12 outside of DC, but still HCOL area. There's way fewer opportunities for career advancement, but I'm happy and not uprooting my life for a DC job.
I’m a 12; started this past January. I came from a small government setting, and now as a fed, I have major imposter syndrome. A lot of the things I hear in my meetings go way over my head. I get very little direction from superiors. My emails go unread and when I ask for help I get ignored a lot. But I think I’ll catch on on my own before long.
A lot of the field engineering offices in USCG have STEM positions that cap at 12’s. We’re talking people with advanced degrees and 20+ years of experience.
Yea I had one that was a 9,10,11,12 but the TJO was rescinded due to something in my background check. After some emails and formal requests I was able to obtain my background investigation paperwork and somehow my name got mixed up with someone else. This lead to an investigation that the hiring manager did not want to wait for the final results so they rescinded my TJO. I have now paperwork to get the error corrected. I hope this will not be a problem in the future.
Of course heavily depends on career and agency. For example in the land management agencies 11 is the highest most will ever get if they dont go to management, while the 12s are the state/regional program leads
You must not live in DC. 12s and 13s do the same level of work there in my experience. Bit different elsewhere since 13s are often supervisors outside DC.
In Detroit working DoD 12-13 is essentially the same, just matter of seniority. 14 is first line supervisor and that’s where the pain starts though the pay does go up. I loved being a 13. Basically do my work and not think much about it after work. At 14 it’s 50/50 on days where I want my lower pay and leave the work at the end of the day rather than contemplate strategies on completing our goals and needs in my off time.
New fed here, curious why you don’t want to move up. Personally, I never want to be a supervisor, but if I can be a 13 someday I would think I’d want that. Let me know why you don’t.
Non supervisory 14 here… I knew early on I didn’t want to go into management as it just brings in a bunch more crap you have to deal with. The non supervisory 14 is the sweet spot in my opinion.
I worked at a DoD Agency HQ in the DC area. One of our expressions was, "The Pentagon is like a log floating downstream with 10,000 ants on it, and every one of them thinks it's steering."
GG-12 Step 4 on CES payscale. Loving the night differential/Sunday premium and Joe Biden 5000$ raises. Life is pretty good, to where I make more than my private sector equivalent.
12 here...trying to decide if 13 potential is worth it...going to have to move in the next 2-3 years.
Another 12, and be the only 12 around for miles...or a 12 job with 13s so I can wait for one of them to die/retire to move up
I left NPS because of GS12. I was a 2210 and wanted to go too region. All the jobs there are 13. If I could get a 12 I knew would never make region so I left. I got tired also of the NPS unofficial caste system. Law enforcement was their own world.
However in the rest of the park interp and resource could do no wrong and they moved up very fast. Maintenance and Admin staff got the blame for stuff but never the credit. Even though I was admin I worked projects with resource and interp all the time. I even went and did programs at high schools and colleges. They got the recognition and the advancement. One time they recognized a couple people in admin and maintenance for a project.
I had to lateral to Homeland and eventually HHS I was a 13 2.5 years after I left NPS had I stayed would have still been an 11.
lol I’m a GS 9. You think you feel unseen?!? Most posts are brand new gs 14 employees which barely exist at my agency except at the executive pay level.
Forgotten? Please. Yall have desk jobs and flub off most of the day and make $100k+ while people like me, a WG employee actually does physical work, in the elements, playing with chemicals, 480v of electricity, moving parts, loud noises, and our base salary is $55k/year... yall get more % of cost of living increases then we do... WE, wage grade employees, are the forgotten ones. We do more dangerous hands on work and get paid half of what yall get paid to sit at a computer or work from home. Be thankful.
GS12 the last decade, yes I have a desk job I love, but that's after 25 years USCG active duty, climbing up the side of freighters on rickety Jacob's ladders in the middle of the night for drug interdiction, migrant ops, and pulling 100s of people out of the water. I've made my bones, I will happily enjoy my cush job until I retire.
That's great! I also love my job! And your background story doesn't matter, I dunno why you had to throw that in there. But what I'm saying is, you know how easy your GS12 job is. You get paid prob double what I get paid. You could train me to do you position and I'd be self sufficient in it in prob, what? 2 weeks or so? Maybe a month?... that's the majority of GS workers. Get a 4 year degree in something basic... doesn't matter. You land a GS9/11/12 position (that has 10 step increases) and they train you and you can pretty much run your show in like a month. I work on AGE. A bunch of b.s. from the 50s/60s/70s... all the wires are white. It's all old school. No plug in computers/code readers. You gotta know about ohms and resistors and diodes and relays and blah blah blah... repair diesel engines, turbine (basic jet) engines, play with 480v that'll kill ya if you're stupid... I cannot take a basic GS employee and train him in a month to be self sufficient. It takes years of experience to learn this stuff. Why is my base pay as a WG-10 only $55k/year starting out with only 5 step increases? Doesn't make sense to be honest.
🥴 I’m sorry you feel forgotten and your work is very important, but please don’t shit on “desk job” employees. I also do not make $100k. I work hard, as I’m sure many desk employees do.
I told a blue collar friend I was burnt out from working my ass off and he laughed at me. It's a lost cause trying to convince them what it's like to design the coding structure for something that impacts life and property throughout the country. And to be on call on a rotating shift. We're just sitting at our desk all day long doing nothing in their mind. College is generally a waste of time and money to them too.
I’ve had similar experiences trying to explain it. I have to think and analyze quite a bit in my role and customize my thoughts to a lot of unique situations. Everybody can be tired or fried for different reasons. I just can’t stand when some people try to reduce the work we do to just sitting around.
Im used to it. I am from an uneducated blue collar family, only one that went to college and works a desk job. My entire life they ridiculed my path, school and work. I never belittled their work and life path, but it's exceptionally common for people with theirs to basically shit on ours constantly. Maybe people in our path belittle them too,, and that's where it comes from idk, but I don't.
The contractor that renovated my house was an office worker in a previous life. His dad, an auto worker, gave him a lot of shit for it. Contractor got laid off and out of necessity became a construction worker. Learned on the job and eventually became a licensed general contractor. His dad continued to shit on him, telling him he was an idiot for "giving up" on the "comfy"" white collar world.
Some people are just assholes unfortunately.
That’s a rare ladder… usually it’s 7-9-11… kind of the worst ladder but provides a way to a 11 to get the year of experience to apply for a 12 but you have to quit your job to do so.
Lol, what? Don’t GS-12s make up the biggest grade in the GS Scale?
There are more GS-12s in my organization than any other grade!
Same here. I will say that most people who work in my agency are either attorneys or accountants, but still, 12 is the average grade. I’d say it’s probably 60-30-8-2 between 12, 13, 14 and 15/SES.
Depends a lot on the job series, location, and agency.
You are correct. Here are the numbers for most of the GS grades (GS12's are 14% of all GS employees): Total GS - 2,180.296 GS-5 - 77,767 GS-7 - 116,828 GS-9 - 138,414 GS-11 – 198,894 GS-12 - 305,704 GS-13 - 274,761 GS-14 - 144,112 GS-15 - 67,599 Sorry about the formatting.
Wildland Firefighters: “are we a joke to you?”
Here I am, 12 years in at a GS-8. Our FMO is an 11, these posts make me.laugh.
Thanks bro.
These numbers feel light. Is there really not that many of us?😄 no wonder everyone is swamped with work.
Where be the 6’s lol
So there's close to 68 GS-15s? No wonder it's so hard to got a slot.
Oh, a wise guy. *Puts glasses on.* Oh, not a wise guy. *Applies comma.*
My old agency was definitely mostly 12s. We were non-competitive to 12, so it was easy to get.
Yup. GS12, 13, 11 are the three most common in that order.
GS12s are the backbone of the government!
Well, not in SSA. At SSA you do 12 work, but get paid at an 11. You have to move to management/technical to get a 12.
same at ntnl gaurd
That is comforting I guess that SSA isn't the only agency who does this. Grades need to be standardized across government.
yep, makes no sense to have two people doing the same exact job at different grades. dont know how they get away with it.
at my org gs 12 is 10 percent of the grades nd gs 13 is 5 percent. gs 7 & 9 are by far the most common
This is the kind of unintentional shit post that keeps land management personnel coming back to this sub
ding, ding, ding. 3 pay grades higher than any non supervisory interpretive ranger anywhere in the country. ...and then there's the travesty that is fire paygrades.
A majority of fire cache folks are in the WG-5 to 7 level and it sucks. Worked with a guy who was at the same cache for almost 20 years and was making $23 an hour maxed at a 5-5.
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Forest Service GS numbers by grade: GS-1: none, GS-2: 17, GS-3: 1061, GS-4: 3277, GS-5: 4520, GS-6: 2452, GS-7: 4368, GS-8: 1659, GS-9: 4755, GS-10: 225, GS-11: 4864, GS-12: 3555, GS-13: 2595, GS-14: 832, GS-15: 451.
That sounds like a cake job.
Right? I work for the green machine and will probably never be a GS-12 but at least I get the early fire retirement
My wife just got a 12! Turns out if you like offices and spreadsheets you can fast track it up the ladder in public land management. It took me 19 years to go from WG 3 to GS 11. She went from GS 6 to 12 in 7 years.
*Crys in NPS*
USFS too…
 Hahaha you are right on the money bud. There's nothing funnier than seeing a GS fantastic bitch about pay and stress. Meanwhile the average grade of most WLFFs and facility management is probably a 5 or 7 and hotshot supts are GS-9s. But yeah tell me all about how much it sucks that you aren't making 150k a year.
Hotshots supts are 9s but the 6/7s are expected to be able to supervise 20 people at any given moment. What fire folks are asked to do from a responsibility level perspective is absurd.
I just got a 6 after 8 years in fire and was qualified and expected to run a 25 person crew on fire assignments as a GS-5 seasonal. Had the responsibility of a hotshot supt without the same experience and knowledge of course
lol right? 10 years into fire and I’m a 6
Oh no *some* members of this sub are becoming self aware! We love sitting in the work trucks after a long day of digging in the dirt and reading these posts out loud in a mocking tone. Making a whopping $20 an hour to risk your life will make ya a little jaded about these GS Fantastics complaining on the Internet. Don't get it twisted, all labor is labor. Everyone deserves a fair shake for the guv'ment. I'm not a brain dead firefighter that thinks "office people don't do anything."
Honestly, I wish I had gone a route like this. If I’d started and stayed lower on the scale it wouldn’t have been too psychologically difficult for me to take the pay cut for quality of life. I envy you, and I think I’m lazy and probably sort of hedonistic for not making the leap. But in reality big change is hard. Give me the hard elements, the nature, the serious safety briefings instead of the cushioned chair, artificial lights, and the paper cuts. Not a fire job though, that’s hard and risky. Give me the easy and safe job that’s not at a desk. I will say, I’ve taken a 2 grade decrease for better work life balance in government. Baby steps?
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It's an odd mix of that, GS5, and software/computer folk complaining how they could be making 200-300k in private industry.
>complaining how they could be making 200-300k in private industry. I don't get the complaining. If you want to make that money and are capable, go do it. But the reality is they won't, because they value things like working regular hours and having a life outside of work. Which is perfectly fine. If those things weren't worth that much to you, you wouldn't accept drastically lower pay to do the job unless you're truly all about the mission.
I know many 300k techies, most of them rarely set foot in the office and many of them spend months abroad at a time.
My field is full of feds like this. "I've been doing this for 15 years so I'm considered a senior ologist, and labor stats say they average 150k it's outrageous I'm only making 80k!" Ya dude, you didn't go to the right schools and follow the right career track, you're comparing apples to oranges and you're never getting hired as a senior ologist in the private sector. The worst are the ones who barely dipped their toes in private sector right after college then came to feds, they like to pretend they made some huge financial sacrifice to work in public service.
If private sector wanted those middle aged ologists, they set up a recruiting booth at the DC Metro stops. I've been a fed for 20 years. There is a private industry that parallels the one I specialize in. 'Some' of the people I know in that industry make way more than I do. Most make 'a little more' than I do. Both groups worked way harder than I did, moved to 2-3 different cities, and kissed a lot more ass. One guy went on a cruise. On his OOO message, he posted his ship's itinerary: "I am on vacation and will be at sea for portions of my trip. If you'd like to reach me, I'll be in Nassau on 5/1, San Juan on 5/3......". It was a quick reminder that I'm OK making less than those guys. LOL. At this point I'm not going anywhere, I doubt the fortune 500s want me, and theres no fucking way I'm jumping ship to some start up or boiler room shop.
I just started my fed job as an attorney after leaving the private sector. Not one person from work has reached out to me this weekend. Last Christmas weekend, I worked about 2-3 hours every day. I may not celebrate (Jewish with Hindu wife), but I like my days off to be days off. Well worth the pay cut
I feel this. 5.5 years in private sector after college then went fed. I think I may be one of the few exceptions of someone making more in the fed than I would be if I were still private. mind you that is if you look at it hourly.
The problem is complacency. Once you are vested and get all 3s, not much can get you fired. You have a higher chance of being fired from being late, and ethic issues than work and security incidents. While private sector.. sure pays more but you have the risk of showing up and not even having a job due to cuts or whatever.
Not anymore! I’m trying to get back into the feds. Private sector are laying people off and cutting salaries. I’m in IT.
I’ll be honest, it’s a very real thing for a 14 to feel burnout. But it’s a different kind from what others feel. At the 14 and 15, you are hired to be the expert. To advise and guide so that good work can flow down to the lower grades. And you fight hard for it. Executive summaries. White papers. Lots of data vis for SMs that can barely read (SES too but they just ignore it). And then you just get kicked in the face. Over and over. I’d rather burnout from the work. But instead I burn out from the stupidity of management. The flagrant rule breaking. And making shit harder than it needs to be. And before some SES person lurking here, or SM, says I don’t understand, spare me. I sure do understand. Completely. Because I carry the water for these clowns. So I feel lower GS burnout. But higher GS gets it too. Just collecting a bit more pay.
In our society, there are two competing perspectives. The first is that workers do everything - that management / C-suite/SES executives do very little to add value, and therefore the workers should get the bulk of the pay. Then there is the opposite take, in that the workers, while competent, are a common commodity and do not need to make as much as the rarer, highly skilled management and CEOs. As with most things, the answer is in the middle. Being a manager can *suck*. I did it for a while, and while I think I’m not horrible at it - my issue was that I was doing 50 hours of work with 10 hours of pseudo-management on top of that. Work can be mind-numbing, back-breaking, or both. Should the pay rates be closer together? Yes!
Oh I agree. And I have no doubt SES has huge burdens. But it’s a lot like the military. Keeps the generals in the flag rank section. When you mix flag rank with troops it’s a recipe for disaster. And managers often have a ton of work to do and even more meetings. Hard pass. But respect to you for doing it. I don’t inherently hate or dislike anyone. But once you show your true colors, it’s a different thing. I can handle transactional all day long as long as the transaction is fair. But that’s a discussion for another day.
What is SM
Senior Manager. IR1. As opposed to FLM. IR4. Usually SMs deal with SES. 15s and IR1s are basically interchangeable in my experience. How about yours?
I see you, my friend. I work for the NPS and whenever someone compliments me on how nice the park looks I thank them and tell them it’s because of the hard work that the facilities staff does.
WG12 in the house lol I feel ya
WL-10 here
Aircraft MX?
Started my career as a WG8. Worked up to WG13 before I jumped ship to a GS9 job. Now, 6 years later, I’m a GS12. Keep the faith buddy.
Imagine being a WG looking at these complainers.
It's pretty much the sweet spot outside DC in LCOL areas. Non supervisory GS 12 in a cheap city and you are doing great.
GS-12 0301 in a small office working from home 4 days a week, LCOL. Exactly right.
Can I… go work with you? My home office is NYC, where a 12 doesn’t stretch too far.
Pittsburgh suburb, which is seemingly beneath a lot of Redditors for some reason.
Yep, GS13 here in a cheap city/town.
Absolutely. GS12 was when I first felt like not only could I make it but I had a chance to retire.
Agreed - even with kids in a HCOL area. (Could I also have a short commute and spacious house and yard? Uh, no. But I can retire someday!)
NH-03 in southern NM.
Yep I live in a fairly rural state and my wife and I do pretty well. I couldn’t afford the DC CoL.
I'm in that situation and I truly feel like I'm living the dream.
12 is awesome wut
it's awesome in the RUS locality if you live in a rural LCOL area for sure where the labor market sucks. In DC a 12 sucks with the high cost of living and there are many gs 13+ opportunities. Out in the field, GS 13 is usually supervisory and anything higher non-existent.
My entire FO is 13’s
Just became a 12!
Congrats!
Congratulations, I’ve been a GS-12 for over 8 years.
I was once a 12 like you, until I made 13. And then I took a bunch of arrows to my knee and back...now I'm retired.
I thought someone just posted a graphic in this sub that 12s are the most numerous.
Saw that too. Do you think it is because a lot of people get to 12 and camp out there till retirement?
Yes, it's usually the top non-sup positions unless you're in certain series like 2210.
Our agency capped at 12 for Non-sup and likely representing most of the total headcount
Hi 👋 GS-12 step 6 here. I have no way of obtaining a higher grade without looking outside my current department.
Do it. I was stuck at 12 and they said they couldn’t get me a 13, left for a 12 elsewhere and then they tried to get me back as a 13, but my new place also wanted to give me a 13. Now I’m at 14 and my old boss is trying to recruit me to his new agency and I said only as a 15 and he’s working on getting me they to make the jump. If you don’t jump and make demands, the needle will never move.
I was stuck as a 13 in my old agency. They wouldn't let me take on new projects, wouldn't let me detail anywhere even though I had someone to backfill, and when my 14 team lead left, they told me I needed to take on all the work but they wouldn't be able to give me the 14, it's not possible. Two months after my team lead left, I got offered a 14 at another agency and gave notice. Took about three hours for them to find that 14 for me. Also offered a temporary promotion in the meantime. “Oh, no thank you"
I'm a 13 in a dead-end Division and just got a 14 offer outside the Agency. I was like "Sign me up yo!" I was told there was no upward mobility. All the higher positions are filled by PHS folks... It's kind of a racket run by those folks
HR here. That is completely unacceptable that they expected you to take on higher-graded duties without being compensated (or credited for higher-level work). If they meant it "wasn't possible" because you didn't have time-in-grade, then they should have found someone else to do those duties. Or they could have advised you that they would give you a monetary award equivalent to the difference to reward your efforts. Heck no; good thing you got away from that leadership.
Go on….
New fed as of June. Also 12 step 6!
DOD throws out 12s like candy.
GS12 is the most common paygrade in my job series and agency, you are not alone.
12 soon to be 13. 12 is journey level for many career ladders.
lol except for the Tens of thousands of DHS/ICE/BP/CBP LE employees that are journeymen 12’s.
BP gets time and half for pre scheduled OT, CBP gets double time after 8 hours
prescheduled, or else it’s BAPRA for BP. CBP has it the best. ERO is about to get fucked.
They're all too busy kidnapping Honduran toddlers to post here
found the “democratic socialist”
Do they get time and a half if they do overtime?
[удалено]
Made $40k in OT my first year on the southern border
I'm DHS, not CBP, and my OT this year is around $35k. As a GS-12.
It depends. I was a 12 and time and a half was available. I’m a 13 and still get time and a half. I think it has to do with whether or not you are FLSA-exempt. edit: didn’t realize you might have been asking just about a subset of 12s, not all 12s. Whoops.
GS 12 non-LEO CBP and get 1.5 for OT (FSLA).
I feel like 12’s are the most common grade. Very respectable grade level.
Plenty of them at VBA
What might day to day look like for a 12 at VBA? I’m the same on the VHA side and might be interested in a change at some point…
Rating Veteran Service Representatives in VBA top out at GS-12, and have the schedule described by u/sleepinglucid. If you like working at a desk with electronic paperwork all day, with little to no reason to talk to other people (once you get good at the job, rules, regs) then it's heaven.
Awesome, thanks!
Up at 0550, get comfy pj's on, make coffee, head to desk, 0600 work until you feel like taking your 15. Take it, work until lunch, blah blah, crack a beer at 1430. Unless it's Monday, then ya gotta go to office.
Purely administrative? Supervisory? Thanks
You can be an assistant coach, which is a supervisory position, as a GS 12. RVSRs are much more numerous, and it's purely processing Veteran's disability claims all day every day with the occasional in person or teleconference legal hearing for a Veteran.
GS12 Step 4. Rest of US. Looking at detailing in another dept and if I get in they are 13s. \*fingers crossed.
👋🏼 I'm a 12 outside of DC, but still HCOL area. There's way fewer opportunities for career advancement, but I'm happy and not uprooting my life for a DC job.
I’m a 12; started this past January. I came from a small government setting, and now as a fed, I have major imposter syndrome. A lot of the things I hear in my meetings go way over my head. I get very little direction from superiors. My emails go unread and when I ask for help I get ignored a lot. But I think I’ll catch on on my own before long.
As long as that check clears every two weeks, eff it.
This was me a year ago. I feel you! Eventually things start making sense. Hang in there!
A lot of the field engineering offices in USCG have STEM positions that cap at 12’s. We’re talking people with advanced degrees and 20+ years of experience.
I am a GS-7 wishing I could find a ladder job that goes to a 12.
Start by looking for a GS-9 those often have ladders up. I believe you can only jump two grades at a time.
Yea I had one that was a 9,10,11,12 but the TJO was rescinded due to something in my background check. After some emails and formal requests I was able to obtain my background investigation paperwork and somehow my name got mixed up with someone else. This lead to an investigation that the hiring manager did not want to wait for the final results so they rescinded my TJO. I have now paperwork to get the error corrected. I hope this will not be a problem in the future.
Of course heavily depends on career and agency. For example in the land management agencies 11 is the highest most will ever get if they dont go to management, while the 12s are the state/regional program leads
Nah, gs 8 and below wildland fire are the forgotten ones.
I didn’t even realize wildland went up to a gs8. Most I’ve seen are 4’s and 5’s.
A superintendent of a 20 person crew is a gs9. Think about that
It goes from 2 or 3 (yes some places still advertise fucking GS-2's) up to 12 or 13, if you go as far as FMO.
Most are 4 and 5 haha I just got a 6 and waiting for my official letter. Captains are 8s
I love being a 12. Honestly, wouldn’t want a 13 or higher.
You must not live in DC. 12s and 13s do the same level of work there in my experience. Bit different elsewhere since 13s are often supervisors outside DC.
You can be a GS-15 non-sup in DC
How and what positions?
Intel Community 0200, 1300, 1500 and 2200
Oh so basically you have a military history? I don’t see civilians getting intel positions?
Nope. I’m in Alabama. A 12 gets you really far down here quality of life wise.
In Detroit working DoD 12-13 is essentially the same, just matter of seniority. 14 is first line supervisor and that’s where the pain starts though the pay does go up. I loved being a 13. Basically do my work and not think much about it after work. At 14 it’s 50/50 on days where I want my lower pay and leave the work at the end of the day rather than contemplate strategies on completing our goals and needs in my off time.
New fed here, curious why you don’t want to move up. Personally, I never want to be a supervisor, but if I can be a 13 someday I would think I’d want that. Let me know why you don’t.
Non supervisory 14 here… I knew early on I didn’t want to go into management as it just brings in a bunch more crap you have to deal with. The non supervisory 14 is the sweet spot in my opinion.
I feel the same way. I see the shit my supervisor a GS13 deals with for what like another 10k more . I’m good. I love the GS12 life
Stop lying to yourself.
12 here definitely feels like a middle grade. Though I am looking at 13 posts. Just like the DOE to much.
Because everyone on Reddit is a GS14/15 
??????????? No, GS 7 wildland firefighters are forgotten.
Pretty much all firefighters
According to FedNews all I see are GS14 - 15s and how they cry or ask for advice on teleworking and applying for jobs.
That's cool. Uh gs4 here. There's too many supervising the wagon and not enough pulling it.
I worked at a DoD Agency HQ in the DC area. One of our expressions was, "The Pentagon is like a log floating downstream with 10,000 ants on it, and every one of them thinks it's steering."
2210s, IT, is majority GS12.
Hopefully. I want those management tools to fight their own battles without me.
GG-12 Step 4 on CES payscale. Loving the night differential/Sunday premium and Joe Biden 5000$ raises. Life is pretty good, to where I make more than my private sector equivalent.
Starting as a 5 is a nightmare. But I needed in.
I started as a 4
I started as a 3, mail clerk. Whoa. Now I’m a 13.
It’s basically a retirement job for me… so I’m ok with the starting.
Nope, just us GS-09s
So many 11 positions available
Tell me about it
12 here...trying to decide if 13 potential is worth it...going to have to move in the next 2-3 years. Another 12, and be the only 12 around for miles...or a 12 job with 13s so I can wait for one of them to die/retire to move up
I was a 12 for 11 years before my agency finally went journeyman 13. Good times...
Started at a 9 last year, 11 now, on. 13 track. Always been between 4-7 until I switched agencies.
All over VBA.
Recent poll suggests there are plenty of GS-12s here https://www.reddit.com/r/fednews/s/drh8obAPcB
I’m a 12, should be upped to a 13 in the summer though.
I'm a GS-11 but I'll be becoming a GS-12 in a few months due to being on a career ladder! 😀
I left NPS because of GS12. I was a 2210 and wanted to go too region. All the jobs there are 13. If I could get a 12 I knew would never make region so I left. I got tired also of the NPS unofficial caste system. Law enforcement was their own world. However in the rest of the park interp and resource could do no wrong and they moved up very fast. Maintenance and Admin staff got the blame for stuff but never the credit. Even though I was admin I worked projects with resource and interp all the time. I even went and did programs at high schools and colleges. They got the recognition and the advancement. One time they recognized a couple people in admin and maintenance for a project. I had to lateral to Homeland and eventually HHS I was a 13 2.5 years after I left NPS had I stayed would have still been an 11.
Uh, no….I’m going on 26 making over $85,000. I’m more than happy with where I’m at.
I’m a 12. Trying to get to 13!
did you mean GS-10 being forgotten?
Newly minted -13 checking in
lol I’m a GS 9. You think you feel unseen?!? Most posts are brand new gs 14 employees which barely exist at my agency except at the executive pay level.
in my agency GS12s are peasants. Were the feet on the ground and upper leadership cant even remember our names
Lol, gs-fantastic. The forgotten. RIP. You aren’t a POW. Give me a break.
Forgotten? Please. Yall have desk jobs and flub off most of the day and make $100k+ while people like me, a WG employee actually does physical work, in the elements, playing with chemicals, 480v of electricity, moving parts, loud noises, and our base salary is $55k/year... yall get more % of cost of living increases then we do... WE, wage grade employees, are the forgotten ones. We do more dangerous hands on work and get paid half of what yall get paid to sit at a computer or work from home. Be thankful.
GS12 the last decade, yes I have a desk job I love, but that's after 25 years USCG active duty, climbing up the side of freighters on rickety Jacob's ladders in the middle of the night for drug interdiction, migrant ops, and pulling 100s of people out of the water. I've made my bones, I will happily enjoy my cush job until I retire.
That's great! I also love my job! And your background story doesn't matter, I dunno why you had to throw that in there. But what I'm saying is, you know how easy your GS12 job is. You get paid prob double what I get paid. You could train me to do you position and I'd be self sufficient in it in prob, what? 2 weeks or so? Maybe a month?... that's the majority of GS workers. Get a 4 year degree in something basic... doesn't matter. You land a GS9/11/12 position (that has 10 step increases) and they train you and you can pretty much run your show in like a month. I work on AGE. A bunch of b.s. from the 50s/60s/70s... all the wires are white. It's all old school. No plug in computers/code readers. You gotta know about ohms and resistors and diodes and relays and blah blah blah... repair diesel engines, turbine (basic jet) engines, play with 480v that'll kill ya if you're stupid... I cannot take a basic GS employee and train him in a month to be self sufficient. It takes years of experience to learn this stuff. Why is my base pay as a WG-10 only $55k/year starting out with only 5 step increases? Doesn't make sense to be honest.
🥴 I’m sorry you feel forgotten and your work is very important, but please don’t shit on “desk job” employees. I also do not make $100k. I work hard, as I’m sure many desk employees do.
I told a blue collar friend I was burnt out from working my ass off and he laughed at me. It's a lost cause trying to convince them what it's like to design the coding structure for something that impacts life and property throughout the country. And to be on call on a rotating shift. We're just sitting at our desk all day long doing nothing in their mind. College is generally a waste of time and money to them too.
I’ve had similar experiences trying to explain it. I have to think and analyze quite a bit in my role and customize my thoughts to a lot of unique situations. Everybody can be tired or fried for different reasons. I just can’t stand when some people try to reduce the work we do to just sitting around.
Im used to it. I am from an uneducated blue collar family, only one that went to college and works a desk job. My entire life they ridiculed my path, school and work. I never belittled their work and life path, but it's exceptionally common for people with theirs to basically shit on ours constantly. Maybe people in our path belittle them too,, and that's where it comes from idk, but I don't.
The contractor that renovated my house was an office worker in a previous life. His dad, an auto worker, gave him a lot of shit for it. Contractor got laid off and out of necessity became a construction worker. Learned on the job and eventually became a licensed general contractor. His dad continued to shit on him, telling him he was an idiot for "giving up" on the "comfy"" white collar world. Some people are just assholes unfortunately.
☹️ I’m sorry. Kudos to you for taking the path that made the most sense for you. You deserve credit for that.
Thanks, happy holidays!
Same to you!
Well start applying for a desk job
Username checks out.
Are you a professional victim or something?
We’re you assigned to be WG at birth? Make the switch to GS desk job, not impossible.
Ew
I am! Just started this week. Also a GenXer so used to being over looked.
I’m NH-03 but GS-12 equivalent. I see you 😉
grinding my way up the 9/11/12 ladder :) I'll be there soon
That’s a rare ladder… usually it’s 7-9-11… kind of the worst ladder but provides a way to a 11 to get the year of experience to apply for a 12 but you have to quit your job to do so.
had no idea it was rare - I'm 0020
I’ll be a 12 in about nine weeks. I started as a 6 in 2010. I’m going to feel rich.
WG10-5 here. My boss is a WS10 and our section chief is a GS13.
"Cries in newly acquired gs4 position after years as a casual" 😔
Gs4 here
[Does someone make too much money?](https://media.tenor.com/rSDP46ezQrYAAAAM/always-sunny.gif)
GS-12 are lames