Proposed Raise May Go Higher, a Bit

President Obama has proposed a 1.4 percent pay raise for both federal employees and uniformed military personnel in January 2011, an amount reflecting the figure indicated by federal pay law that is supposed to act as only the starting point for setting raises. Employee organizations will encourage Congress to boost the increase, as it has done in many similar situations in the past. Typically the boost has been 0.5 percentage points, a formula Congress has followed for roughly a decade for sweetening the military raise in order to close an indicated gap between private sector and military compensation. In most years, federal employees have had their raises boosted by the same amount in the name of pay parity, although the pattern was broken last year when the January 2010 raises were set. Even if the raise is bumped up to 1.9 percent, it would be the smallest increase since no raise was paid in 1986. Boosting the raise to that number, much less a higher one, could be difficult in light of OMB director Peter Orszag's comment that even a 1.4 percent raise "frankly I think to a lot of Americans sounds pretty good." Political appointees, including political (but not career) SES members would have their pay frozen.

 

Back | Published: September 8, 2010