Operations Research Analyst (Industrial-Base Economics) – Cross-Portfolio Analysis Division (CPAD)
JOA#: GS-2026-1515-122 (CPAD Economist)
Department: Department of War (DOW)
Agency: Office of the Secretary of War (OSW)
Hiring Organization: Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation (CAPE)
Open Period: 10/1/2026 – 11/15/2026
Pay Scale & Grade: GS-12/13/14/15
Salary Range: $102,415 to $197,200
Series & Appointment Type: 1515 Operations Research, Permanent - Schedule B Excepted Service
Location: Pentagon, Arlington, VA
Work Schedule: Full Time
Clearance Requirements: Must be able to obtain and maintain a Top Secret/SCI
Citizenship Requirement: Open to all US Citizens
Relocation expenses reimbursed: No
Summary:
CAPE is hiring! We provide objective, analysis-based advice directly to the Secretary and Deputy Secretary of War on everything the Department of War does, and our work has a direct effect on the US budget and national security.
Within CAPE, an interdisciplinary and non-advocate organization, the Analysis and Innovation (A&I) Deputate is responsible for a standing strategic assessment of the Defense Program as a whole, focused on its long-term feasibility and its coherence with the defense strategy. A&I also maintains the analytic methods, standards, data infrastructure, and modeling and simulation tools on which CAPE’s analysis rests. It performs CAPE’s role as Executive Secretary of the Department’s Analysis Working Group (AWG), the body chartered to raise analytic standards across the Department.
The Cross-Portfolio Analysis Division (CPAD) works at the Department-wide level and connects the defense strategy to the program-level analysis beneath it. It frames the whole-program resourcing questions the Secretary and Deputy Secretary of War face, develops and stress-tests alternatives against an adaptive adversary, and presents the results for decision.
CPAD is seeking an economist with expertise—or an interest in developing expertise—in industrial-base economics. The position advances CPAD’s analysis of economic warfare and economic statecraft and helps shape the long-term defense program research agenda in these areas. This includes the effects of economic instruments, the Department’s own and adversaries’, on defense production, supply access, allied industrial participation, and the program’s exposure to retaliation. The economist weighs the intended effect of an instrument against the risks/unintended consequences it creates for the program and integrates the results into CPAD’s whole-program resourcing analysis.
The industrial-base economist also assesses, at the level of the whole program, how the defense industrial base would need to transform to field the force the strategy requires, including the transformation’s resource implications. The work addresses investment, lead time, and incentives a prospective shift in capabilities or force structure would require of the base. It also addresses whether the programmed force can be built, sustained, and regenerated over the long run within plausible fiscal and industrial constraints. The economist draws on the Department’s industrial-base policy organizations for the assessment of the current base and directs CPAD’s own analysis to transformation.CPAD does not repeat the standing industrial-base assessments -- fragility scoring, single points of failure, capacity and throughput -- but consumes them and reads them for the rate at which the base can deliver.
Analysts in CPAD review one another’s work before it reaches principals, to the methods and rigor standard set by CPAD’s partner division, the Strategic Analysis and Analytic Innovation Division (SAID). Senior analysts mentor the division’s junior analysts.
Duties and Responsibilities:
Selectees will apply economic theory and econometric techniques at the forefront of academia to support the following topics:
Economic Warfare and Statecraft: Assessing the long-run effects of economic instruments, the Department’s own and adversaries’, on defense production, supply access, allied industrial participation, and the program’s exposure to retaliation, and weighing the intended effect of an instrument against the exposure it creates. Example projects may include estimating how economic disruptions at potential chokepoints propagate through the Defense Industrial Base.
Industrial-Base Transformation: Assessing, across the whole program, the changes the defense industrial base would require to field a prospective shift in capabilities or force structure, and the investment, lead time, incentives, productive-capacity requirements, and broad resource implications of those changes. Example projects may include modeling and estimating Defense Industrial Base incentives and evaluating the likely production effects, resource requirements, and second-order consequences of candidate market mechanisms.
Long-Run Production Feasibility: Assessing whether the programmed force can be built, sustained, and regenerated over the long run within plausible fiscal and industrial constraints, drawing on the current-base assessments of the Department’s industrial-base policy organizations. Example projects may include estimating future defense production capabilities using macroeconomic models (e.g., CGE or HANK models).
Integration into Resourcing Analysis: Integrating industrial-base and economic-statecraft findings into CPAD’s whole-program resourcing analysis and its recurring products for the Secretary and Deputy Secretary.
Methods Development: Working with SAID to develop the methods for economic-warfare and industrial-base analysis, which SAID validates and maintains as CAPE standards.
Model Review and Interagency Collaboration: Working with other Federal agencies and research organizations to evaluate the assumptions, evidence, and limitations of the economic models used in CPAD analysis, under SAID’s review standards, and building the Department’s capacity to assess such models.
Quality Control: Reviewing CPAD analyses before they reach principals, to the study-design, evidence, provenance, and stated-uncertainty standard set by SAID.
Mentorship (GS-14/15): Mentoring junior analysts in framing, method, and writing for principals.
Quantitative Modeling: Using and developing economic and econometric theory to model industrial capacity, cost, and economic exposure at the program level.
Qualifications:
Basic Requirements:
A degree in operations research from an accredited college/university; or at least 24 semester hours in a combination of operations research, mathematics, probability, statistics, mathematical logic, science, or subject-matter courses requiring substantial competence in college-level mathematics or statistics. At least 3 of the 24 semester hours must have been in calculus.
Preferred Education and Expertise:
A Ph.D. in economics, finance or a closely related quantitative field is strongly preferred. CAPE is particularly interested in economists whose doctoral research, professional experience, or demonstrated analytic interests include industrial organization, macroeconomics, the defense industrial-base, econometrics, trade/international trade, structural labor, public finance or supply-chain resilience.
In addition to meeting the basic requirement above, you must also meet the qualification requirements listed below:
Required Skills:
Your qualifications will be evaluated on your knowledge, skills, abilities, and competencies in the following areas:
Quantitative Methods: Experience with econometrics, macroeconomic modeling, cost and production modeling, or capacity analysis, and with the software used to perform them.
Collaboration: Ability to work with a broad spectrum of internal and external organizations, such as industrial-base and economic-defense organizations, the Military Departments, federally funded research and development centers, academia and/orindustry to obtain data and test findings.
Executive Communication: Ability to present economic analysis in concise written products and oral briefings for senior Department officials.
Defense Industrial-Base Economics: Experience using operations research techniques (such as simulation, cost-benefit analysis, or optimization modeling) to analyze industrial capacity, production and cost economics, or defense industrial-base analysis at the level of the whole base or a major sector, including how a base changes: the entry of new producers,capital investments, and the incentivesthat bring capacity into being.
Desired Skills:
Defense Acquisition and Production Knowledge: Understanding of the defense acquisition and production system. Practical experience navigating, extracting, and analyzing complex datasets from acquisition, logistics, and industrial-base tracking systems, to conduct rigorous quantitative assessments.Ability to translate raw procurement, cost, and scheduling data into predictive models or decision-support tools that evaluate the efficiency and constraints of the production and acquisition pipeline.
Economic Warfare and Statecraft:Experience applying mathematical, statistical, or network optimization methods to model the systemic impacts of economic statecraft (e.g. sanctions, export controls, tariffs, investment restrictions, and supply-access measures) and of their effects on defense production, allied industrial participation, and retaliation exposure.
Specialized Experience: To qualify at a grade, you must have at least one year of specialized experience (12 months at 40 hours per week) equivalent to at least the next lower grade level, performing the duties and demonstrating the competencies listed for that grade:
Part-time or Unpaid/volunteer work experience:
Background Checks and Security Clearance
You will be required to obtain and maintain a Top Secret or Top Secret/SCI security clearance. For more information regarding security clearances click here.
How to Apply:
Required Documents:
1. Resume:
a. IN DESCRIBING YOUR EXPERIENCE, BE CLEAR, SPECIFIC AND DETAILED. WE MAY NOT MAKE ASSUMPTIONS REGARDING YOUR EXPERIENCE.
b. Include your name, address, and contact information, and for each position the hours worked per week and the dates of employment or volunteer service (month/year to month/year, or month/year to present). One year of specialized experience equals 2,087 hours, or 52 weeks at 40 hours per week; part-time hours are prorated. Experience that does not state exact hours per week, or lists them as "varies", will not be credited. For additional information see: How do I write a resume for a federal job
c. Do not include any photos and Personally Identifiable Information (i.e., Social Security Number, Birthdate) on your resume.
d. Resume must be limited to 2 pages and a minimum size 10 font. Please save your resume as a PDF file to preserve the 2-page length.
2. Transcripts: To count toward the qualification requirements, education must come from an institution accredited by an accrediting body recognized by the U.S. Department of Education. A copy of a diploma alone is not sufficient.
a. Foreign Education: Education completed at a foreign college or university may be used to meet the requirements if you provide proof that the credentials have been evaluated as at least equivalent to those earned in an accredited U.S. program.
3. Writing Sample:Demonstrate your analytic ability and writing skills in one page, addressing the following: Identify one economic instrument that the United States or an adversary could apply and assess its likely long-run effect on U.S. defense production. State the causal mechanism, principal uncertainties, possible retaliation, and evidence needed to test the assessment. Recommend whether and how the United States should employ or mitigate the instrument.
4. Veterans Preference:veteran eligibility documentation (DD-214 Member #4 Copy, VA Letter, Standard Form (SF) 15 as applicable). Please note: If you are a veteran who has not yet been discharged, you may provide a statement of intent to discharge from your agency to receive Veterans Preference under the VOW (Veterans Opportunity to Work) to Hire Heroes Act of 2011.
5. SF-50: Your latest SF-50 (if applicable) showing your tenure, grade and step, and type of position occupied. Remove all Personally Identifiable Information (Social Security Number and Birthdate). If you receive an updated SF-50 after initially applying, please provide the updated document to CAPE to be added to your application. If you’ve had a break in service – please provide your original appointment SF50 in addition to your resignation SF50. If you do not have your latest documents, you can submit a request to the National Personnel Records Center to obtain them – see guidance here: https://www.archives.gov/personnel-records-center/civilian-non-archival
6. Military Spouse Preference Eligibility documentation (if applicable).For Priority Placement Program, you must include a copy of the Military Spouse PPP Self-Certification Checklist along with the documents identified on the checklist to verify your eligibility for MSP, such as PCS orders/verification of duty location assignment and a copy of marriage certificate or license. For eligibility under Executive Order 13473, acceptable documentation includes: verification of marriage to the servicemember, verification of member’s 100 percent disability or verification of member’s death while on active duty.
7. Free Response Essay Questions:Optional section to demonstrate your commitment to improving the efficiency of the Federal government, passion about the ideals of our American republic, and commitment to upholding the rule of law and the United States Constitution. You will not be scored against your responses for this section.
Please visit the CAPE Careers website for more information on CAPE, our benefits and more.
How You Will Be Evaluated:
Subject matter experts will evaluate your qualifications before any referral. If you meet the minimum qualifications for this position, your application will be assessed in a multi-hurdle process that ends in a ranking and referral.
Resume Review (First Hurdle): Subject matter experts will review your resume to determine qualifications based on the required competencies identified above.
Qualifying Structured Interviews (Second Hurdle): If the subject matter experts determine that your resume reflects the required competencies, you will have a panel interview (virtual or by phone) to assess your experience against those competencies. The interview may include in-depth questions or an exercise or case study to measure your depth of knowledge.
Ranking and Preference: Qualified candidates receive a score between 70 and 100, before any points for veterans’ preference. Your answers are verified against the information in your application and by reference checks. Preference is applied to applicants who move forward after the qualifying interviews.
Selection Process: Hiring managers receive a certificate listing the qualified candidates eligible for selection. If you are not selected for this position, you may be considered for similar positions for up to six months from the certificate date, and the certificate may be shared with other CAPE hiring managers. If you are selected for an interview, you may be asked to give a presentation, analyze a case study, or take part in several rounds of interviews.
Agency contact information:
Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation (CAPE)
Email:
osd.pentagon.cape.mbx.esd-support@mail.mil?subject=CAPE%20ORSA%20Application
Additional Information:
Priority consideration programs will continue under their current operating procedures:
Military Spouse Preference (MSP) Eligible: Military Spouse Preference applicants, must be selected and placed at the highest grade level for which they have applied and been determined best qualified up to and including the full performance level. You must include a completed copy of the Military Spouse PPP Self-Certification Checklist dated within 30 days along with the documents identified on the checklist to verify your eligibility for Military Spouse Preference. Click here to obtain a copy of the Military Spouse PPP Self-Certification Checklist.
NOTE: Military spouses are eligible for one permanent noncompetitive appointment using their preference eligibility for the duration of the active-duty sponsor's assignment to a permanent duty station, as long as the military spouse has not declined or accepted a permanent Federal or non-appropriated fund position in the commuting area of the sponsor's current duty location. If you certify that you have not used your preference at your sponsor's current duty location and it is discovered to be untrue, you may be subject to loss of MSP and possible disciplinary action.
Military Spouses, under Executive Order (E.O.) 13473
You are eligible for this hiring category if you are a spouse of a member of the Armed Forces serving on active duty for more than 180 days other than for training; OR are a spouse of a 100 percent disabled service member injured while on active duty; OR are the un-remarried widow or widower of a service member who was killed while performing active duty.
Supporting documentation: You are required to submit acceptable documentation of your eligibility forE.O. 13473 which may include:
• Verification of the marriage to the service member (i.e., a marriage license or other legal documentation verifying marriage);
• Verification of the member's 100 percent disability; and/or
• Verification of the member's death while on active duty.
Additionally, you may need to submit a Standard Form-15 (SF-15), an Application for 10-Point Veterans' Preference, and applicable supporting documents as noted on the form.
To obtain a copy of SF-15, go tohttps://www.opm.gov/forms/pdf_fill/sf15.pdf
Military Reserve (MR) and National Guard (NG) Technicians PPP Eligible: MR and NG technicians PPP applicants must be selected and placed at the full performance level if determined well qualified. You must include a completed copy of the Military Reserve and National Guard Technician PPP Self-Certification Checklist to verify your eligibility for Military Reserve and National Guard Technician preference. Click here to obtain a copy of the Military Reserve and National Guard Technician PPP Self-Certification Checklist.6.
Military Reserve (MR) and National Guard (NG) Technicians Receiving Disability Retirement PPP Eligible: MR and NG technicians receiving disability retirement PPP applicants must be selected and placed at the full performance level if determined well qualified. You must include a completed copy of the Military Reserve and National Guard Technician Disability PPP Self-Certification Checklist to verify your eligibility for Military Reserve and National Guard Technician Disability preference. Click here to obtain a copy of the Military Reserve and National Guard Technician Disability PPP Self-Certification Checklist.7.
Retained Grade PPP Eligible: Retained Grade PPP applicants, must be selected and placed at the full performance level if determined well qualified. You must include a completed copy of the Retained Grade PPP Self-Certification Checklist to verify your eligibility for Retained Grade preference. Click here to obtain a copy of the Retained Grade PPP Self-Certification Checklist
Schedule B Excepted Service Public Notice: Under this recruitment procedure, applications will be accepted, and selections are made for vacancies as they occur. A tentative offer of employment will be rescinded if the selectee fails to meet the pre-employment requirements, including failure to report to any of the scheduled appointments.
Employed Annuitants (Reemployed Annuitants): Applicants in receipt of an annuity based on civilian employment in the Federal Service are subject to the DoD Policy on The Employment of Annuitants.
Selective Service: Males born after 12-31-59 must be registered or exempt from Selective Service. For additional information, click here.
Employment Eligibility Verification: Washington Headquarters Services uses E-Verify to confirm the employment eligibility of all newly hired employees. To learn more about E-Verify, including your rights and responsibilities, visit: http://www.dhs.gov/E-Verify
Nepotism: Under the provisions of 5 USC 3110, an individual may not be appointed into a position if the position is under the supervisory chain of command of a relative.
Fair and transparent
The Federal hiring process is set up to be fair and transparent. Please read the following guidance.
Equal Employment Opportunity Policy
What is financial disclosure and why does this job require it
New Employee Probationary Period
Reasonable Accommodation Policy
Selective Service Registration
| Location | Washington, DC |
| Salary | $102,415–$197,200 Per Year |
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