Analyses done for Congress have projected that only small percentages of federal workers would be directly affected by a change in same-sex benefits policy. A Congressional Research Service report of earlier this year estimated that 34,000 federal employees are in same-sex relationships, including state-recognized marriages. (CRS did not specify how it arrived at that figure, nor whether Postal Service employees were included; either way, the figure would be below 2 percent of the workforce.) Separately, the Congressional Budget Office estimated last year that a bill to extend eligibility for health insurance and survivor annuities to same-sex domestic partners (even without a requirement for marriage) would result in just 3,000 employees adding family health coverage and about 300 newly retiring employees per year electing survivor benefits. It based its estimate on the experiences of businesses and state and local governments that have made similar policy changes.
