Government contracts are among the most lucrative available for any business. A government contractor is a private company that makes products for or provides services to the government according to the terms dictated in a legally binding agreement. Federal, state, and municipal governments work with a wide variety of businesses to help complete tasks that they cannot finish on their own. For example, the government hires contractors to design and build offices and other structures. Government contracts seem especially attractive during an economic recession because private buyers may not be readily available during these times. Government agencies, representatives, and affiliates also tend to work with the same companies repeatedly, so landing a government contract may be the start of an enduring professional relationship. The most common contracts stem from military and defense related expenditures, although communications take up a large portion of the overall budget as well. Some very well known corporations are government contractors including Lockheed Martin, Boeing, ITT Corp, Hewlett-Packard, Dell Computers, Verizon Communications Inc., IBM, Sprint Nextel, AT and T, Qwest, Motorola, and Perot Systems Inc. Government contractors, or prospective ones, have to register with the Central Contractor Registration (CCR) database. Not all companies are eligible to bid on every available job because a certain percentage of them are reserved for local businesses that are low income, small businesses, minority owned companies, female owned businesses, veteran owned companies, and owned by a disabled person. In fact, roughly 23% of government contracts must go to small businesses.
