Copyright 2000 The Washington Post
The Washington
Post
September 5, 2000, Tuesday, Final Edition
SECTION: METRO; Pg. B02; FEDERAL DIARY
LENGTH: 717 words
HEADLINE:
Pay Increase Could Come With Rollback of Retirement Plan Levy
BYLINE: Stephen Barr , Washington Post Staff Writer
BODY:
Although Congress returns this week
to wrangle over unfinished spending bills for federal agencies and programs,
most of the bread-and-butter items important to employees appear on track for
approval.
Pay, naturally, is at the top of the list.
The House
and Senate versions of the Treasury Department, Postal Service and general
government appropriations bill for fiscal 2001 assume a 3.7 percent raise for
General Schedule employees. Once the bill gets to the White House,
administration officials will recommend how much of the increase will be set
aside for "locality pay." The locality pay formula strives to reflect
private-sector wages in urban areas, and if the trend holds, workers in the
Washington-Baltimore region will get a raise slightly higher than 3.7 percent
next January.
Federal unions had hoped for a higher raise, given the
budget surplus and strong economy, but that seems unlikely. President Clinton
recently signed the fiscal 2001 defense appropriations bill, which provides the
military with a 3.7 percent increase. With the military raise locked up, federal
employee advocates have little running room in which to make a case that the
government's civilians deserve a higher amount.
But the Treasury-Postal
bill would provide some extra pocket change for federal employees. The House and
Senate bills would repeal the higher contributions toward retirement that
employees have been paying since January 1999.
The higher rates were
phased in as part of a balanced budget agreement, and employees currently pay
0.4 percent more of their salary toward retirement than normal. A further
increase of 0.1 percent of salary was scheduled for 2001.
The
Treasury-Postal bill would repeal the higher contributions in effect as well as
prevent the further increase from taking place.
Because Congress appears
unlikely to block an automatic 2.7 percent pay increase for members and staff,
the bill would raise the pay caps for some federal employees in the Senior
Executive Service and other high-level pay systems. The cap on federal executive
pay would rise to $ 133,700 annually, from $ 130,200.
Other provisions
of the Treasury-Postal legislation would extend the government-wide child care
subsidy program, which lets agencies use budget money to help employees pay for
licensed day care. The bills also would continue the general ban on abortion
coverage in the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, while requiring that
FEHBP cover prescription contraceptives.
The House version would require
a study to determine the potential for providing federal employees with paid
parental leave. The Senate has not addressed the matter but seems likely to
agree to the study proposal.
In the Senate, a separate spending bill,
providing appropriations for the Departments of Labor and Health and Human
Services, would create medical savings accounts in FEHBP. Similar language also
appears in a patients' bill of rights bill pending in a House-Senate conference.
The tax-free accounts would let employees set aside money to pay for
routine health care and would come with an insurance policy to cover major
medical problems and long-term hospitalization. But federal employee and retiree
groups contend that only people without health problems would find them
attractive and that allowing these people to shift coverage would undermine
FEHBP insurance pools and drive up its costs.
Two bills important to
many retirees remain stalled in the House.
The Ways and Means Committee
has signaled that it will not take up legislation to modify the
"government pension offset," which reduces spousal Social
Security benefits for numerous federal retirees who receive a civil service
pension.
House bills to eliminate or modify the "windfall elimination
provision," which reduces Social Security benefits for some retirees, have not
been scheduled for a committee hearing.
Online Discussion
Daniel C. Adcock, the assistant legislative director at the
National Association of Retired Federal Employees, will join us at noon tomorrow
at washingtonpost.com for an online discussion of what the recently approved
long-term care insurance program means for federal employees and retirees.
Stephen Barr's e-mail address is barrs@washpost.com.
LOAD-DATE: September 05, 2000