Fedweek

Passage of the larger spending bill without mention of a federal pay raise will represent the completion of a strategy followed all year of allowing the White House’s recommended 1.3 percent increase to take effect by default. One final step would be needed, an executive order to carry out the raise. That typically is issued about a week before year’s end–although it could come any time after final action on the budget. The GS raise is to be divided as 1 percent across the board with funds for the other 0.3 percentage points parceled out in differing amounts by locality, resulting in raises ranging from about 1.2 to 1.6 percent; detailed tables by grade and step are released with the annual order. About 102,000 employees are to be under 13 new localities and stand to get raises slightly higher than they would have received by remaining in the catchall “rest of the U.S.” locality, the lowest-paid. Even bigger raises are to go to about 7,600 who are moving from RUS into one of the pre-existing localities–particularly those going into one of the highest-paying zones such as New York, Boston or Washington-Baltimore. The annual executive order also sets pay scales for certain special categories of employees such as administrative law judges, senior executives and senior professionals, who are paid within ranges; for them a raise is not automatic but it does increase the maximums payable. Wage grade employees are to receive raises matching the GS increase in their area, even though they are under a separate locality system.