The GS pay cap is rising from $183,500 to $191,900. Image: Oleg Golovnev/Shutterstock.com
The 2024 federal employee pay raise will result in increasing the pay caps that apply to senior positions and to many in the upper ranks of the GS.
The GS pay cap is rising from $183,500 to $191,900. That limit will apply in 2024 to those in the upper steps of GS-15 in many of the higher-paid localities, as well as to the upper steps of GS-14 in the San Francisco locality, the highest-paid.
For career SES, senior level and senior scientific and professional positions who are paid within a range and get performance-based raises, the minimum pay will rise from $141,022 to $147,649 and the maximum to either $221,900 or $204,000. The higher figure applies to agencies where the performance evaluation systems are certified as making meaningful distinctions based on differences in performance; most agencies have that designation.
Certain additional post-employment restrictions apply to those paid at a rate of basic pay equal to or greater than 86.5 percent of the rate for Executive Schedule Level II, which will be $191,144.
Other impacts of the raise include:
* Almost all “special rate” employees will receive a 4.7 percent increase plus the higher of the applicable locality rate or their special rate, but not both. In seven cases for 2024 the locality rate will now exceed the special rate and the special rate will no longer apply while in one, an additional boost of 3 percent will be paid; details are here. Otherwise, the special rate system will be unchanged.
* While the raises are set according to the boundaries of GS localities, the long-standing policy of limiting raises for federal wage system (also called wage grade) employees at the GS amount will continue. However, a complex capping mechanism applies; details are here. Blue-collar employees receive their raise at differing times of a fiscal year.
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