[benj111]

Is it not the case in the US, that public sector employees tend to be paid less, in exchange for other things like job security, pensions etc?

[gamblor956]

That depends very highly on the particular job.

Professional employees (lawyers, accountants, scientists) make less in government (usually much less), but non-professional employees usually make more in government.

[oasisbob]

How are you defining "professional" in this context?

There's a classical sense of professional it seems you're reaching for, but I'm having a hard time thinking of a non-professional white-collar worker which would do better in federal government than the private sector.

Eg, surveyors are clearly professionals. Software developers? IT?

[jki275]

Software engineers, IT, EE, ME, tend to be paid significantly less than they would make outside of gov service. This of course varies a bit by level, but it's generally true.

[garmaine]

No, they tend to be just paid less, period. They pay and benefits is WAY better in the private sector, and job security is only partially true.

[munk-a]

This comment has been downvoted but I wanted to highlight that it is quite correct, people actually working in the public sector tend to be paid poorly compared to similar private sector jobs, this is a bit of a new trend where the previous generation in the US was more familiar with public sector jobs being good paying reliable jobs that could help secure a family into the middle income bracket but that time has passed.

I am excluding, by the way, private contractors working in the public sector which tend to be grossly over paid but lack any sort of pension benefits.