How hiring at Hill works

Federal job or contractor job?

There are two kinds of jobs at Hill, and they work differently.

Federal civilian jobs: you work for the Air Force or another Defense agency. These jobs are posted on USAJOBS (opens in new tab), the government's official job site.
Contractor jobs: you work for a private company that holds a government contract, and you apply on the company's own careers site. The work may be on base, but the company is your employer.
On this site, federal cards are marked "Federal civilian." Every other card is a contractor.

The General Schedule covers most white-collar federal jobs. It has 15 grades, GS-1 to GS-15, and each grade has 10 steps. (OPM: General Schedule (opens in new tab))
Locality pay is added on top. Utah doesn't have its own locality area, so Hill falls under "Rest of U.S." (OPM: locality areas (opens in new tab)) For dollar amounts, see the current GS pay tables (opens in new tab) and pick "Rest of U.S."

Trade, craft and labor jobs are paid by the hour under the Federal Wage System. Rates are set for each local wage area. (OPM: Federal Wage System (opens in new tab))
Hill is in the Utah wage area (No. 139), which covers Box Elder, Davis, Salt Lake, Tooele, Utah and Weber counties. (OPM: wage areas, PDF (opens in new tab))
WG is the regular trades scale. Leaders (WL) and supervisors (WS) have their own rates. Find the current Utah schedule on DoD's wage schedules site (opens in new tab).

Some Hill engineering and business postings say "NH." That's DoD's Acquisition Demonstration project (AcqDemo). Instead of grades, it uses broad pay bands, levels I to IV, with raises decided in a yearly contribution-based cycle. (Federal Register, June 2026 (opens in new tab))

The company sets your pay and benefits.
Jobs on federal service contracts covered by the Service Contract Act (you may see "SCA" in a posting) must pay at least the local prevailing wage and fringe benefits that the Labor Department sets for each contract. (Labor Department: Service Contract Act (opens in new tab))

A clearance lets you work with classified information. The levels you'll see are Confidential, Secret and Top Secret, sometimes with SCI.
You can't get one on your own. Your employer asks for it. Contractors may only request clearances for their own employees, only for jobs that need one, and never to build up a pool of cleared people. Federal postings on USAJOBS show the clearance in a "Security clearance" field, such as "Secret."
Citizenship: the rules tell contractors to keep non-U.S. citizens out of duties that need classified access. Federal postings say so directly, for example "U.S. Citizenship is required."
Source for the contractor rules: 32 CFR 117.10 (opens in new tab).

These are job-posting phrases, not official terms. In practice:

"Clearance required" or "active clearance": you need to already hold the clearance when you start.
"Able to obtain" or "must be eligible": the employer will request a clearance after it hires you, so you need to be able to pass the background investigation. That starts with being a U.S. citizen.

First, ask the person who invited you where the interview is and how you'll get in. Many contractor offices are off base.
Bring the right ID. Since May 7, 2025, a driver's license without the REAL ID star won't get you onto a military base. Use a REAL ID-compliant license or a U.S. passport. (TSA (opens in new tab), REAL ID FAQ (opens in new tab))
For Hill's own rules, including how visitor passes work and where the visitor center is, see Hill AFB: visitor access (opens in new tab).

Veterans' preference applies to new hires in the competitive service and in many other federal jobs. Where applicants are scored, eligible veterans get 5 or 10 extra points: 5 for qualifying service, and 10 for a service-connected disability or a Purple Heart. (OPM: FedsHireVets (opens in new tab))
Watch for "Direct Hire Authority." Many Hill postings use it, and veterans' preference doesn't apply to those hires. (OPM: Direct Hire Authority (opens in new tab))
Two special paths let agencies hire eligible veterans without the usual competition: the Veterans Recruitment Appointment (VRA), and the authority for veterans with a 30% or higher service-connected disability.

Agencies can hire some military spouses without the usual competition: spouses of active-duty members, of members with a 100% disability from active-duty service, and of members killed on active duty. Veterans' preference doesn't apply under this path. (OPM: military spouses (opens in new tab))

Veterans' preference is a federal hiring rule. Federal contractors fall under a different law, VEVRAA: they can't discriminate against protected veterans, and they must take affirmative action to recruit, hire, promote and keep them. (Labor Department: VEVRAA (opens in new tab))

For one-on-one help, see the Resume help tab. It lists the base's Military & Family Readiness Center and Utah's veteran employment services.

Rules change. Always check the job posting and the official page linked here. Last checked Nov 2026.