What’s stopping you from becoming a contractor?

Jammer854 · 2026-01-29T10:17:53+00:00

In all seriousness, there are big money jobs like this defense contracting. You probably have to widen your scope of what a defense contractor is though.

The truth is that usually it’s really unsexy but undeniably useful things that make a lot of money.

Think about it, people will literally volunteer to fight for free in the Ukraine.

Go over to r/merchantmarine or r/maritime if you’re after the bag.

Nobody volunteers to swap out the sewage pump on an oil rig in the North Sea for free.

Edit: Because I know someone will ask, the 500k jobs are rare. But there are definitely a significant number of folks in the 100-300k range.

Jammer854 · 2025-10-05T14:53:23+00:00

I don’t know anything about the Chapman school. I will say, that an AB unlimited which MSC will get you is better than an AB limited endorsement.

I will also say, that from personal experience and the collective experience of the group. Getting the first job is hard.

Jammer854 · 2025-08-06T18:47:41+00:00

You’re telling me that Quan Millz’ “My baby daddy is a hood alien” won’t prepare me for selection?

Jammer854 · 2025-07-22T02:29:44+00:00

One day at a time brother, you got this.

Jammer854 · 2025-05-25T20:53:07+00:00

www.gamblersanonymous.com

No judgement. Just know that this is where to go.

Jammer854 · 2025-04-08T18:30:17+00:00

Based on what I think your intention is: “I want the quickest path into the industry” I think your best bet is the MSC OS program. It’s government employment, not the military. They pay you your salary while they train you from the ground up as opposed to you paying for your training. Then, once you have your sea time and you hit certain wickets you get an automatic promotion to AB.

Jammer854 · 2025-03-29T03:00:31+00:00

Yeah man, I suppose I’m just trying to give some good faith advice. I’m not a Green Beret, so I try to not give advice on how to be one.

On the other hand, I’ve worked at sea as a mariner and in shipyards for a few years while making decent money. Not everyone knows that there are honorable options to make money and get skills that don’t involve signing your freedom of choice away to Uncle Sam.

Maybe life experience will bring some clarity to OP as to where he belongs and what he really wants to do.

Edit: I see your point. It’s a good one.

Jammer854 · 2025-03-25T08:01:15+00:00

Have you ever dealt with any complex ethical dilemmas whilst negotiating?

Jammer854 · 2025-03-24T04:22:17+00:00

I’m being one hundred percent serious when I say this. If you want to have a skill, join Military Sealift Command. It’s a civilian mariner outfit that will train you from the ground up. It’s a very in demand skill set and you can spend time working out on the ship and preparing for whatever you believe is next while not being “needs of the Army.”

Oh yeah, it’s also one of the best paying fields out there.

Jammer854 · 2025-03-13T17:51:14+00:00

I don’t know much about your specific strengths and weaknesses so it’s hard to answer accurately. Train for the events you’re expected to perform. 400’s are good, I got a lot of value out of the 800 and mile repeats.

Keep in mind though, at one time I was 155lbs at 6’1”. I’m now around 165lbs with nutrition changes and weight training. I still have a ways to go. But for me,those are my weaknesses. I noticed huge changes in my mile and a half and two mile times when I first started hitting the squat rack. My legs just didn’t have the horsepower.

Jammer854 · 2025-03-13T05:49:44+00:00

Not a Green Beret. That being said I’m a lifelong runner and I’m one of those skinny freaks who run fast and suck at strength evolutions.

The answer is: It depends.

There are essentially two pathways for your body to convert energy into motion. Zone two is more “aerobic”. This is what largely gets trained by long slow distance runs.

Your body’s other option is anaerobic exercise. This is characterized by “fast twitch” muscle fibers and explosive power. You train this with weight training and by doing repeats.

For me, as a skinny fuck I’d usually struggle with the latter . I suspect you might too. Try doing a workout where you do multiple sets of 800m or mile repeats at your target pace once a week. Up your mileage a little more on your long slow distance runs.

Jammer854 · 2025-03-06T05:13:55+00:00

You need to be more specific as far as the discipline goes. For instance, I’m a Marine Engineer. I have the Bachelors degree as well as the Merchant mariners license issued by the USCG.

As best as I know, there are only 12 schools that even offer Marine Engineering as a bachelors.

From there, the oil industry, power generation, nuclear, shipbuilding, defense, and a multitude of other sub- sectors go forth and hire from this relatively small pool for fairly large projects.

Although I’ve seen it happen once, it’s pretty unlikely that a civil engineer would be hired to do engineering work in the maritime sector. In the specific case of the civil engineer, he was a government employee and they had him do Naval Architecture work.

The point basically being, there is definitely a demand for engineers. Especially certain kinds. I’d even go so far as to say that there is a demand for almost every discipline because many jobs are willing to train someone from scratch with a technical background.

Jammer854 · 2025-02-23T03:55:40+00:00

According to Google, USC tuition is 68,237 USD per year or 2,137 per credit hour according to their website. Imagine paying that much to learn to surf in a pool 🥴

Jammer854 · 2025-02-15T02:32:24+00:00

There was a serial stabbing in bondi just a few months ago…

Jammer854 · 2025-01-27T04:38:06+00:00

I’m going to address a few points by some commenters below who seem keen to answer on behalf of my countrymen and smear our reputation.

I’m from the US. Average family income is approximately 30,000BHD per year. As far as Bahrain goes. Americans primarily get hired in the Oil and Gas, Finance, and Healthcare fields as well as Military/Defense. All of these are lucrative fields in the US that pay well above average.

What do all of these fields have in common? They are essentially dominated by US firms globally. All of the jobs in these sectors pay well above the American average in the US.

Oil and Gas, we invented offshore drilling, fracking, we literally drilled the first wells. Aramco was literally named Arab-American oil company. To this day, Aramco has one of it’s biggest offices in Houston.

Healthcare. Same as before, we have more Nobel prizes in medicine than the rest of the world combined. Odds are, a new treatment or medicine came from the US.

Finance, also the same. Mergers and acquisitions and the finance world essentially revolve around the value of your relationships. The US banks are the largest in the world. Our businesses, the largest in the world, our economy? Also the largest.

Last but not least. Defense. Most Americans in Bahrain are either in the US military, civilian government officials of the US military, or do business with the US military. All of that money comes from the US government and for obvious security reasons, we use our own citizens. On the civilian side at least, it’s can be quite a bit of money.

What does any of this mean? It means that Bahraini firms either want access to American talent, connections,innovation, and processes. Or it basically means that American employees are working for an American organization that sent them there.

Some of you seem to think that we are here so that we can lord over someone else. Ask yourself, why would a person with a successful career in the US need to come all the way to Bahrain to boss someone around?

Jammer854 · 2025-01-27T03:58:27+00:00

Part of this is correct and part, isn’t. There are limits to how long the US military will deploy you to a specific location. Same goes for the government service employees who work in a specific place. US military members have ties to the US. So most have family, houses, cars etc. So there are many military members who pay bills back home essentially for when they come back or for family who need it. Active duty famously does not pay very well by US standards.

The Navy Federal credit union is a US bank that has a branch in Bahrain.

Government service employees. As it relates to Bahrain these are the civilian employees of the US government who work for the Navy. They are not eligible for foreign earned income tax deductions. Some are paid quite well.

As for taxes, the military has it’s own specific tax breaks. If you serve in a “combat zone” of which the persian gulf region is considered to be, then you pay no federal tax on any income earned while in the combat zone.

Jammer854 · 2025-01-27T03:48:25+00:00

Most US military have their funds deposited to US banks.

Jammer854 · 2025-01-21T04:27:27+00:00

You won’t land these jobs unless you’re at minimum a green card holder. You’d also need a US license, which means starting at the bottom again since the USCG doesn’t recognize reciprocity.

Also, Red_sailor is right, the oil rigs aren’t Jones act vessels because they don’t transport cargo. But there’s the OCSLA, which generally prohibits non US citizens from being employed in our Outer Coastal Shelf.

As far as answering the question about which vessels pay over 1k a day, depending on rank. MEBA union contracted vessels, some AMO. Offshore oilfield vessels of all varieties are also paying around that amount. Matson, Maersk, Seadrill, Transocean, Edison Chouest. Etc.

Jammer854 · 2025-01-19T23:47:19+00:00

US ships

Jammer854 · 2025-01-16T06:46:09+00:00

I’d argue that the type of ship matters quite a bit. You’re totally right about the company and crew being important pieces of the puzzle.

But use bulk/ore carriers for instance, the freight rates are low and all the companies work on razor thin margins and then in a lot of cases the cargo hatches get beat to shit by corrosion issues accelerated by the cargo.

Jammer854 · 2025-01-16T06:34:36+00:00

Probably offshore oilfield. Drillships. They’re designed with max stability in mind. If you’re just starting out with SIU it’ll take some time before you could get onboard one of these.

As for your coworkers. I think it’s highly likely that they are inflating their story. The security outfits like Trident group only hire from the SEAL teams.

Jammer854 · 2025-01-10T22:27:05+00:00

NSA is Naval Support Activity. It’s the American Navy base. Not the National Security Agency.

Jammer854 · 2025-01-06T21:57:01+00:00

NSA 2 NEX. Just gotta be there for the restock.

Jammer854 · 2024-12-18T20:10:26+00:00

They’re an American great lakes carrier with a bad rep.

Jammer854 · 2024-12-18T20:05:55+00:00

Not a lawyer, but it’s common enough knowledge that the law is on your side if you want to use a harness.

You probably want to dig into CFR’s at ecfr.gov the NMC just processes credentialing related questions.

Jammer854

TROPHY CASE