Panel is Key Player in Raise Setting

The subcommittee annually plays a key role in the debate over the annual federal pay raise, since it is the appropriations committees, not authorizing committees, that provide money for agencies to spend. For the January 2006 federal pay raise, the issue will be whether to endorse the 2.3 percent the White House recommended or to continue the recent practice of setting the raise according to the military raise figure, which for 2006 almost certainly will be 3.1 percent. In recent years, supporters of pay parity have waited until full committee voting to push their plan, largely out of concern about losing in the Transportation-Treasury subcommittee. The subcommittee last year ordered the Office of Personnel Management to issue a report due next month comparing overall compensation of federal versus non-federal pay, which opponents of pay parity might use to argue that federal pay is not so far behind private sector rates as employee organizations, and some in Congress, contend.