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ai.gov

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Re: AI.gov

#221

Post by jjcm »

adeelk93 wrote: post #209
jjcm wrote: post #94

The Presidential Innovation Fellow is the highest level role they're offering as part of this. For this, the requirements are "mid-senior/executive career professional experience in a subject matter expertise" with "experience collaborating with and leading cross-functional teams". The requirements feel analogous to a staff/principal level role in the software industry, so just for comparison here's the compensation…

Two things: - your 18 year figure is inaccurate, I know people who have made it to the top of the pay scale in half that time - GS-15 step 10 is not the cap for a role like this one. this is scientific/technical expertise, which is 20% higher ($220,200). Not to mention awards. https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/senior-executive-s...

The Executive Schedule is available for 18F as well as other agencies, but my understanding is that it is not true for this. Screenshot from the job page itself showing that this is a GS job capped at the GS-15 Step 10: https://image.non.io/6dbd428b-a356-4ec9-85a8-f1e84b4f3880.we...

Re: AI.gov

#222

Post by meowtimemania »

tomohelix wrote: post #32
godelski wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some of the jobs go up to $180k/yr. That's not too bad considering it doesn't look like it requires DC location. But others like the grad assistant for $22/hr is laughable. Still, I agree there's a problem with salaries not being competitive. I've interned at DOE labs before and lots of people don't stay for long.

I mean the grad assistant is basically a post-doc position isn't it? Considering the stability and perks from a government job, I think that is not too far from market rate. But go up and those 180k jobs would be easily 300-400K in the industry. I doubt anyone who can do that work would be interested in a measly 180K. Unless it comes with a visa...

I don't think post docs get 300k-400k outside of major tech hubs. 180k is on the higher end of the software pay scale across most the USA.

Re: AI.gov

#223

Post by jjcm »

davisr wrote: post #118
jjcm wrote: post #94

The Presidential Innovation Fellow is the highest level role they're offering as part of this. For this, the requirements are "mid-senior/executive career professional experience in a subject matter expertise" with "experience collaborating with and leading cross-functional teams". The requirements feel analogous to a staff/principal level role in the software industry, so just for comparison here's the compensation…

Why did you assume that everyone is motivated by money? After $100k, what difference does it make for one's happiness? Personally, I wouldn't want such a shallow individual working in my government.

> After 100k, what difference does it make for one's happiness?

Fairly significant depending on the location. Keep in mind that for Washington DC, the average cost of living required income is 91,388 for a family of four[0], or 76,894 after taxes.

This role pays $105k after taxes. One way to think about this is this means you have $2.3k per month in discretionary funds, versus 16.5k per month of discretionary funds for a big 5 job.

If you're considering retirement, you'll achieve your savings goals 7 times faster with big tech. That's a big difference in happiness.

If you're considering education for your children, you can afford private school or an ivy league education with big tech. With the government role you can't.

Certainly there are a select few who will look at this and be motivated to serve their country, but more and more what we're seeing is that patriotism is at a record low[1]. If we're looking to attract the best of the best, we're culling the selection pool greatly by underpaying significantly. Relying on patriotism and asceticism is a hard thing to bet on.

[0] https://livingwage.mit.edu/counties/11001 [1] https://news.gallup.com/poll/394202/record-low-extremely-pro...

Re: AI.gov

#224

Post by donmcronald »

vinhboy wrote: post #218
empath-nirvana wrote: post #9

The US government can't legally pay the salaries required to find AI experts right now (just look at the salaries on the open positions). So all this work will end up being done by contractors who _can_ pay those salaries while the contractors skim off the top. The US really needs a special schedule for software developers if they want technical expertise in house (and they really should have technical expertise in h…

As someone who used to work in government contracting, this comment is so freaking true. The whole thing about contractors is so spot on. The only slight difference I would add is that the contractors will NOT hire the best talent, they will hire whoever they can to fill the position, for the cheapest price, so they can claim to have fulfilled their RFP. It's a dead end.

I haven't done much, but anything I ever deal with that involves the government and contractors is the same. The contractor has an astronomical margin and, in addition to not hiring the best talent, they don't care about their employees and have a high churn rate.

These are also the same ones that are super eager to have AI replace their (unappreciated) employees. They don't care about quality at all and as long as they fulfill the contract with something barely working that's all that matters to them.

I predict things are going to worse and worse when systems don't work. Having failures in critical institutions that are life altering for the people that are unlucky enough to be the outliers is going to become the norm IMO.

Re: AI.gov

#225

Post by cbozeman »

cedws wrote: post #4

Our governments care dearly about "AI safety" (nobody actually knows what that means or is qualified to define it yet) but not a right to privacy.

LOL, we all know exactly what that means...

> Doesn't threaten the profits of entrenched gigantic megacorps.

> Doesn't threaten the status quo of the megawealthy.

> Doesn't threaten the highly-entrenched people in the government.

AI safety is about making AI "safe" for their pocketbooks.

Re: AI.gov

#226

Post by cbozeman »

BD103 wrote: post #90

Occasionally I enjoy viewing the HTML of websites to try to deduce what web framework they are using. I couldn't figure it out for this one, but here are some things that I find interesting: - On line 90 of the homepage, there is a single script called `document.createElement('main');` - The website uses the ` ` tag to support multiple sources for images - script.js on the website has ANSI art of the US flag ( https:…

America is so patriotic, we put our flag into a script.

To quote Jeremy Irons playing Simon Gruber from Die Hard With A Vengeance, "HAH! God, I love this country!"

Re: AI.gov

#227

Post by meowtimemania »

empath-nirvana wrote: post #9

The US government can't legally pay the salaries required to find AI experts right now (just look at the salaries on the open positions). So all this work will end up being done by contractors who _can_ pay those salaries while the contractors skim off the top. The US really needs a special schedule for software developers if they want technical expertise in house (and they really should have technical expertise in h…

I wonder if there's some way for the government to partner with one of the major tech co's (e.g. microsoft/google/apple) similar to how the military seems to partner with private co's (e.g. lockheed martin).

Re: AI.gov

#228

Post by gardenhedge »

Silly question - but what do people in AI related roles do? Are they looking for software engineers to use/integrate AI products such as OpenAI APIs or are they looking for researchers working on AI papers trying to break new ground?

Re: AI.gov

#229

Post by mikrotikker »

tsunamifury wrote: post #84
mazlix wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Simply put, there's no first-world country in the world where top talent can earn even close to a US salary, which largely due to the fact that US is relatively permissive towards large income disparities. Why do you think it's A -> B and not B -> A? What factors of the US being permissive towards large income disparities do other nations lack that prevent them from paying equivalent salaries. One specific thing I'…

It has an undeniable ability to draw the best talent away from Europe and Asia, who want to earn more. I have worked with armies of these people -- they left their home countries for the opportunity for the big check. And those checks are way past the disparity you describe from at will employment, this is 10x more not 1.4x more.

This is why open borders and immigration is a right wing capitalist value and not a left wing one. Many left wing activists have fallen into this trap of towing the line of giant US corporations that strip the world of their human resource.

Re: AI.gov

#230

Post by RIMR »

Racing0461 wrote: post #82
RIMR wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know everyone has already figured out what you're trying to say, but for clarity, do you mind elaborating on what you meant here?

Why add a section on immigration? The stuff on the page is already known. They just add it to cross off a checkbox of what they wanted to signal. And its just a generic description of the visas and nothing localized to th visa type and ai. And for the other commenters calling me "right wing', my views are pretty much '04 Obama. It's just telling how far off the rails we have gone.

>My view are pretty much '04 Obama

Yeah, that's right wing...

Also, nothing on that page was factually incorrect, so we come back around to the original point: Immigrants were brought up, you hate foreigners, and you got mad that they were included at all.

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