Salary For Embassy Workers

It is a common misconception that embassies are "foreign soil." They're not. It's just that, under the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, local law enforcement can't access diplomatic premises without permission. That's where the "foreign soil" fallacy comes from. But as far as employment laws go, the US embassy in Buenos Aires is in Argentina and Argentinian (not US) minimum wage laws apply.
 
I was browsing on the US Embassy website for job openings, and currently there are 2. One of them is for ad administrative clerk and the compensation is FSN-6 of the local compensation scale, which means ARS 3,592 bi-weekly, roughly ARS 7200/month.

Compared to a similar job for the Italian Embassy in Buenos Aires, where the Salary is around €2300 net/month, it looks like the US Embassy is exploiting the local population.

Can anybody shed a light on this? I always thought that working for Embassy lead to a great salary and load of benefits, and assumed it was the same for any Embassy...

As an American that salary is embarrassing obviously they have picked up tips from WalMart.
 
I understand from what I have been told that the US Embassy used to pay ok, but they do not adjust local workers salaries to inflation (because in the US they dont have inflation they say, so that is why the salaries are where they are and why there is a lot of turnover ......
 
It is actually a locally sourced worker for the Italian consulate in Buenos Aires. They don't sponsor for a VISA and they require at least 2 years of continuous residence in Argentina to make sure that person is "integrated with the local reality".
They don't need a college graduate, just a high school diploma. If you have a higher degree, the better.
However the Italian hiring process involves a sitting for a written translation test, a sitting for an oral translation test and formal interview, plus a work simulation.

The position at the US embassy... I don't know, it is not clear. It looks like they will decide directly without all of the selection fuss.
At the Italian interview you have to show them your boobs and grab your butt [daily]
 
At the Italian interview you have to show them your boobs and grab your butt [daily]


C'mon, it is not necessarily like that. Of course there is a lot more sexism and lot less political correctness in an Italian workplace, in my experience.

For example, my former boss used to say out loud that in the UAE they 'got it right' because when they walk, there are the men, the camels, and then the women follow. Or that the men ride in the pickup, the wives on the pick up, etc. Since he was the number 2 in there, nobody dared to reply - neither no. 1. Then later in private senior managers told me "how sorry they were that my boss was such a jerk", but they never said that publicly among them. just in 1:1 conversations with me (which of course meant that I kept hearing that bullshit 'til the last day I worked there).
Another time we had a consultant over, a former employee now retired, it was the second time he was me, and somehow felt to praise me to a senior leader saying something along the lines "you really have to stay on top of her". Again, I simply left the room, then the senior leader apologizes but said "we cannot fire him, he is such a good consultant, we have nobody else with his expertise".
 
Don't be too surprised. In Argentina they publish the measurements in ad and require photos with the resumes. And post age limits.
 
Don't be too surprised. In Argentina they publish the measurements in ad and require photos with the resumes. And post age limits.

What surprises me is that in the Italian job ad they specified the candidate must be physically fit, whereas the US job called for equal opportunity employment regardless of sex, age, religion, disability, etc. Thumbs up for uncle Sam!
 
What surprises me is that in the Italian job ad they specified the candidate must be physically fit, whereas the US job called for equal opportunity employment regardless of sex, age, religion, disability, etc. Thumbs up for uncle Sam!

And there you go. You just quantified the value of being attractive eye candy, ARS 23400 / month.
 
I wasn't earning that money, unfortunately. Not candy enough! :D
 
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