3 ms·

You think that 24 individuals per year is "a large chunk of the US population"? That is confusing.

• metaphor 10y ago
  You've taken that out of context. Try over 2 million employees between active duty and civilian workforce in the US Department of Defense[1] alone for which the discussion at hand is very much applicable. The devil is in the details. You'll lose your job not because you defaulted on a mortgage, but because you failed to maintain a valid security clearance, which is predicated on--amongst other factors--an ability to faithfully satisfy debts. What you read was a mere snippet of one study which reported 24 contractors in 2009 who appealed. What it doesn't touch upon is how many contractors simply accepted without appeal, and completely omits federal employees altogether. Furthermore, security clearance reinvestigations are a lagging indicator, generally running on 5-15 year cycles depending on clearance level[2]. If defaulting on a mortgage doesn't bite immediately, it inevitably will when reinvestigation rolls around. [1] http://www.defense.gov/About-DoD http://www.defense.gov/About-DoD [2] http://www.dss.mil/psmo-i/indus_psmo-i_updates.html http://www.dss.mil/psmo-i/indus_psmo-i_updates.html
  • jholman 10y ago
    Your points about it being only 24 individuals are fair. But even 2 million individuals is not "a large chunk of the US population" -- being less than 1% -- and that's assuming that all employees of the US DoD need to maintain a valid security clearance (which I'll just grant you for the sake of argument, although it seems unlikely to me).