Order Implements Federal Pay Raises

Area Workers to Get 3.44% Boost

President Bush issued an executive order this week locking in a 3.44 percent pay raise next year for federal employees in the Washington-Baltimore area. The increase will bring the average salary of the region's General Schedule workers to $80,425, according to the Office of Personnel Management.

Federal workers have known for weeks that Congress approved, and Bush signed, a bill providing for a nationwide average 3.1 percent increase in base pay. But the executive order was needed to divide the 3.1 percent into the two components of federal pay raises -- a 2.1 percent general increase for everyone and a 1 percent adjustment that varies by locality.

The average annual salary worldwide of the 1.8 million federal civilian employees will be $63,125, according to OPM. Federal employees, on average, have received a pay raise of at least 2 percent in every year but two since 1969, according to the Congressional Research Service.

Most of the locality zones are in metropolitan areas, but one zone, called the "rest of the U.S.," covers employees who work outside the geographically designated zones. Under the order, federal raises will vary by region, largely because of differing labor costs in each area. (The locality pay does not vary according to the cost of living in various regions.)

The biggest pay increase will be for employees in the Raleigh, N.C., area, who will see a 5.62 percent jump in salary, said Donald J. Winstead, deputy associate director for pay and performance policy at OPM. Winstead said federal salaries in Raleigh and a few other areas were recently found to be lagging substantially behind private-sector salaries.

Many of the government's white-collar employees work outside large metropolitan areas, and they will receive a 2.83 percent raise, Winstead said.

Richmond area federal employees will see a 3 percent raise. New York area workers will get a 3.77 percent boost, Boston area employees a 3.39 percent increase and Chicago area workers a 3.34 percent raise.

Under the order, the annual salaries of Cabinet members will increase to $183,100 (up from $180,100). Members of Congress and federal district judges will be paid $165,200 (up from $162,100). The vice president, the speaker of the House and the chief justice will be paid $212,100 (up from $208,100), according to the president's order. Associate justices of the Supreme Court will be paid $203,000, up from $199,200 this year.

The executive order also triggered adjustments in the pay scales of Foreign Service officers, members of the Senior Executive Service, law enforcement officers, administrative law judges, blue-collar workers and others.

Bush had wanted a smaller average nationwide increase for federal civilian employees. In February, he proposed a 2.3 percent average raise for civilian workers and a 3.1 percent increase for members of the armed forces. Lawmakers of both parties, instead, deferred to the "pay parity" tradition and granted civilian workers an average raise equivalent to that awarded to the military.

The raise will take effect next month, with most employees seeing the difference in paychecks they will receive in late January. The new pay tables are posted at the OPM Web site, http://www.opm.gov .

Staff writer Stephen Barr contributed to this report.