During my career, defense contractors have generally paid a lot more with much more generous benefits (I've seen fully employer paid 401K plans to the IRS maximum), and have been a much more stable employer. Since contract work hours are billable, you generally get paid for each hour you work, unless you are working for the wrong company and only get a salary. This naturally limits extra hours to those that are truly needed, and leads to a good work/life balance.
Other than stability, none of those applied to Raytheon while I was there.
The 401k match was 6% which, while good, didn't even come to what my wife gets from her non-profit. I was paying 25% of my health coverage, which is the highest proportion if any of my five employers. (I will day, though, that Raytheon had the best family coverage rates of any of them.)
I was salaried, and other than a few times was required to record no more than 40 hours in my timesheet regardless of how much time I needed to put in. The work/life balance was highly dependent on the program you were on, and I got trapped on a bad one.
Some parts make you pay 0% of health coverage. It varies.
If you were told to record no more than 40 hours in my timesheet, then that means you DO NOT put in more than 40 hours. You're supposed to go home. If you were told to stay and this was for a government contract, it's a violation that you're supposed to report. Unless this was decades ago, you got training that told you so.
Honestly, though, defense contractor pay is less location-dependent because a lot of the jobs are billed through to the DOD. Defense jobs can even best the industry--- just not in major areas with high costs of livi g.
I spent my time in the industry in Dallas, which is pretty close to the optimal balance of salary and metro area. My salary was not at industry averages. I remember, vaguely, Raytheon's salary bands. They weren't anything to write home about, and you were not getting anywhere near the top ends in a low COL location like Dallas.
It depends on who is judging. I recall that you were unemployed for quite a long time because nothing was up to your standard. This suggests that your impression of "industry standards" is inaccurate, at least for someone of your capability.
Is there any defense contractor that pays anywhere near industry standards?