Bush Cuts Pay Raises for Federal Workers, Citing National Emergency

TBo.com ^

[Sub-Driver]

Bush Cuts Pay Raises for Federal Workers, Citing National Emergency By Jennifer Loven Associated Press Writer

CRAWFORD, Texas (AP) - Citing a state of national emergency brought on by last year's terrorist attacks, President Bush on Friday slashed the pay raises most civilian federal workers were to receive starting in January. Under a law passed in 1990, federal employees covered by the government's general schedule pay system would receive a two-part pay increase with the new year, a 3.1 percent across-the-board increase plus a pay hike based on private-sector wage changes in the areas where they work.

This law outlining federal pay kicks in because Congress has not yet passed the appropriations legislation directing a specific increase, said Amy Call, a spokeswoman for the White House's Office of Management and Budget.

The White House couldn't say exactly how many federal employees the change would impact, but said it would be almost all.

Bush's pay decision is yet another blow to federal workers, many of whom are facing big changes in job descriptions under the Bush administration.

Earlier this month, the administration announced it wants to let private companies compete for up to half of the 1.8 million federal jobs. Also, in the new Homeland Security Department, Bush won the broad powers he sought to hire, fire and move workers in the 22 agencies that will be merged.

In a letter sent Friday to congressional leaders, Bush announced he was using his authority to change workers' pay structure in times of national emergency or "serious economic conditions" and limiting raises to the 3.1 percent across-the-board boost. Military personnel will receive a 4.1 percent increase.

That means that the additional so-called locality-based payments would remain at current levels because "our national situation precludes granting larger pay increases ... at this time," Bush said.

The White House quietly released the letter to journalists via e-mail late on Friday, the middle of a long holiday weekend when most Americans were apt to be paying little attention.

Officials of unions representing federal workers could not immediately be reached Friday night for comment.

Call said the locality-based payments have rarely gone into effect since their creation in 1990, either because former President Clinton limited them or Congress prescribed other salary increases.

"The whole locality-based adjustment ... for the most part doesn't go into effect," Call said.

The White House estimated that the overall average locality-based pay increase would amount to about 18.6 percent. Bush said granting the full raises would cost about $13.6 billion in 2003, or $11.2 billion more than he proposed for the year - a cost the nation can't bear as it continues to battle the war against terror.

"A national emergency has existed since September 11, 2001," Bush wrote. "Such cost increases would threaten our efforts against terrorism or force deep cuts in discretionary spending or federal employment to stay within budget. Neither outcome is acceptable."

The president noted that the raises still amount to more than the current inflation rate of 2.1 percent.

"I do not believe this decision will materially affect our ability to continue to attract and retain a quality federal workforce," he said.

[sneakypete]

I wonder if this year's savings will be sufficient to cover this year's salaries of the new hires at the expanded Department of Education.

Probably not,since he just pledged to spend $5+ BILLION on AIDS in Africa and the Carribean,and that's over half of the projected "savings" outlined here.

I just can't wait to see what kind of spin the religious Bush-Bots put on this latest expensive bit of pandering to the Dim base. Sooner or later people will have to wake up and admit that the Dim base IS the Bush base.

[meyer]

We (government employees) now fall even further behind the private sector. There is a greying of the federal workforce that is going to have some very tragic results. I know most FReepers will violently disagree with me, but as a conservative federal employee for the past 33 years I do beleive my experience is there and what I am seeing is a mass exodus of experience from the government to the private sector. I currently make about 40% less than the local private sector does. Sure, I am hanging in there for the retirement, but what incentives are there beyond retirement? None! By law the work I do cannot be turned over to the private sector. There is no one coming along to be grown into the jobs when we leave. There are currently three of us in our work area, I am the youngest of the three at age 52+, so what happens when we leave? Where is the experience going to come from? IMHO Bush is shooting himself in the foot on this one.

The "graying" of the workforce is very true, but I don't think it is limited to government jobs. I can agree that the government must pay competitively or risk not gaining replacement workers for the soon-to-retire folks.

One of the things that the government has offered is a relatively secure position. You've essentially traded peak pay for job security, though it probably didn't seem that way 30 years ago. Of course, if you're good at what you do and in demand, you already have a degree of security plus the pay in the private sector. I agree though, 40% is a wide pay differential. I think somebody is asleep and doesn't care about "brain-drain". It happens to companies as well.

What I'm seeing in our operation is an exodus as well, but not so much to enter the private sector as just to retire. There're, I beleive, a couple of thousand people in our operation that will be retiring in the next 5 years. They will need to be replaced now to allow for training since it takes a couple of years to become proficient in most technical jobs (and that's with some formal schooling).

I can't put this all on Bush - the part of dot-gov he sees in generally in the offices of Washington where there is likely a good deal of waste. Perhaps he needs to have an audit done on all federal jobs to reclassify and/or eliminate/add where needed. I'd be willing to bet that a lot of operations haven't audited their pay v. the private sector in the 30 years you've been there.

[sneakypete]

I'm not civil service so its hard to make a relationship between these pay grades and other jobs outside of the civil service protection.

I'm not exactly sure where the cut-off between "middle-management" and "upper-management" begins,but I would say a GS-10 is middle-management,and a GS-13 is closing in on upper management. I know I'm going to get flamed for this,but their pay schedules really aren't out of line with the private sector. In fact,a case can be made that the ones in upper-managment are severely underpaid when compared to the salaries of their equals in the civilian work force.

Granted that there are too many "deadwood" and affirmative-action managers doing nothing but occuping office space,but that is a seperate issue.

[yoe]

It's something AlGore never dreamed of when he was asked to take a look-see at the management of government. Perhaps he was too busy wiring schools to the internet he invented.

That and giving the "Gore Tax" to AT&T for the wiring of rural schools...it is still on your AT&T bill under someother guise, never was removed!

I hope this means that the Congress and Senate will not be granted another pay raise also. A promising step by this President and a resounding one for the American people who are not tied to the Federal tit.

[sneakypete]

We have a bona fide national emergency, and I applaud Bush for making the right call.

I'm in 100% agreement! Providing $5+ BILLION in AIDS funding to pay for "education" and free drugs for those in Africa and Haiti who have AIDS surely DOES qualify as a "national emergency",and it takes a ruler with the vision of Bubba-2 to recogonize this.

Maybe not OUR "nation",but SOMEBODY'S "nation",and THEY are surely having a "emergency". Why should we waste this money on Americans,when we can spend it on foreigners?

Your tax dollars at work.

[wingnuts'nbolts]

I believe I read that when G.W.B. took over the WH the pay scale for his staff was significantly below that of the Clinton administration.

[sneakypete]

That must be why Bush has gotten serious about the invasion of illegals and is now serious about the borders.

Borders/smorders! We don't need no stinking borders! What we need are more new houses for these unfortunate minorities,and Bubba-2 has pledged to spend BILLIONS to build them new houses.

[Toddsterpatriot]

White House estimated that the overall average locality-based pay increase would amount to about 18.6 percent.

Everyone seems to be ignoring this one. 3% is much so significant compared to that.

If private sector jobs pay so much more, get a private sector job. Otherwise, stop whining.

[sneakypete]

Hopefully the Homeland Security Office will either A) expose major overlaps (inefficiencies) among various agencies and get rid of them. This will hopefully reduce the size of government.

ROFLMAO! Did you forget your sarcasm tag? This is a whole new level of bureaucracy,and will only increase the size of gooberment.

[Mr Rogers]

I'm working military test. We have a mix of military, GS & contractors. Those of us in the military were brought in for our experience in how the future weapons systems will be used. Since most of us have no experience in test, we turn to the civilians to find out how to structure the test -ie, how many runs will be needed for some statistical significance, or what Lockheed engineers mean when they say, "Widget A isn't failing, it really is government owned widget B causing the problem".

The GS folks are generally GS-13 engineers or statistics pukes making 70 - 80K + benefits. The contractors we hire (because we don't have enough military or GS engineers available) cost the government an average of $180K. Someone hasn't figured out that in 'outsourcing', we still have to pay a competitive salary, benefits - and then an extra pad for the company's profit. IMHO, we would be a lot better off paying for GS people instead of paying TRW or SAIC a fee to hire & pay for contract hire.

Folks can slam the GS people if you want - but in testing military equipment, they are extremely valuable...and cost less than hiring a private corporation!

[sneakypete]

Actually, he could probably do better by offering the postal service to UPS and FedEx.

HorseHillary! Neither is even close to being competent to deliver anything outside a city. When I order stuff,I ALWAYS try to get them to ship it to me using the USPS,because they offer both safer AND quicker service. They also don't leave your stuff out in the rain if you're not home,and they don't require you to stay home ALL DAMN DAY to sign for something that has to be signed for. With the post office,you can just take off and go to your local post office to pick it up on your own schedule. UPS and Fed Ex don't even HAVE local offices. Hell,they don't even really have local phone numbers anymore. The closest UPS office to where I live is 55 miles away,and they have a unlisted number. Even if I could manage to get it,they wouldn't allow me to go there and pick up my package. I know because I've tried.

From what I've seen, there's plenty of graft and corruption (not to mention inefficiency) there to cut costs in half.</I

And every damn bit of it is related to affirmative-action hiring,and fear of EEO complaints. You don't really think the affirmative-action employees will go away if the gooberment closes down the USPS,do you? What they will do is demand UPS and Fed Ex hire them at their old levels,or lose their mail-deliver contracts.

[RightOnline]

Agreed........but I wonder how these same Gubmint employees feel after hearing this, then reading about the new expenditure of untold billions on AIDS research.

[sneakypete]

To think otherwise makes you a moron, or a straight ticket Libertarian voter.

Correction. You could also be a pre-teen male. Nobody else is immature enough to think that anarchy is a viable political system.

Small difference.

Another correction. NO difference.

[mikenola]

Ok, as a defense contractor , I'm obviously biased, but my argument is this.

Yes, contractors are at first glance more expensive than their civil service equivalents. However, I would argue that they are more effective, as there are typically more stringent controls on their performance (read, financial incentives).

Also, contractors can be replaced at will (if the contract is written correctly), which is virtually impossible with the civil service "job for life" ethos.

Finally, there is financial risk associated with civil service employees. At least in my command, I've noticed that the deadwood GSs , the ones that have it the best , are also the first to file EEOC complaints, union complaints. There has been more than one instance when a project was delayed or cancelled due to the financial hit of a lawsuit against the command.

In the long run, contractors can be a more cost-effective solution provided that the contract is written correctly and performance monitored.

[sneakypete]

I believe this is called.....

Bull$%*t. He isn't giving them something they wouldn't have gotten anyhow,and it taking credit for making some kind of cut. Meanwhile,he IS spending BILLIONS to give to Haiti and Africa for AIDS medicine and education.

Typical Bush. Speaks out of both sides of his mouth,as he panders his way to black votes by buying them with tax dollars.

[Mr Rogers]

Perhaps. From what I see, most contractors seem interchangable in productivity with the GS folks. It is certainly easier to fire them if the work in test diminishes. However, I have a hard time getting around that 70K / 180K differential. I'm sure the benefits for GS workers cost a lot. But even if the benefits = salary, we'd be looking at 140 vs 180. That seems a steep price to pay for flexibility.

Of course, you pointed out a lot depends on how the contract is written. It could be ours are written poorly.

[sneakypete]

The U.S.P.S. union is the fiercest in the entire world

There is no doubt that the postal unions are dominated by "true believers" Marxists.

(why do you think they need their own police department, to protect them from us or us from them?).

Grow up. Postal inspectors do a excellent job investigating mail fraud and theft. They are a neccessary part of the USPS because it is a nationwide federal organization,and the ONLY things they investigate or make arrests for are crimes related to the US mail.

[dreamusic]

What hypocrisy. The House and Senate keep giving themselves higher salaries while everyone else in government is expected to cut back "for emergencies".

[sneakypete]

Perhaps the H1-B program could be expanded to include replacement bureaucrats from less fortunate countries.

Well,we ARE going to need a LOT of Spanish-speaking gooberment workers soon,but they don't need no stinking visa!