Lawmaker to propose 4.6 percent pay raise

Federal employees would get a 4.6 percent average pay raise in 2002 under a measure that a lawmaker will introduce Tuesday. Rep. Steny Hoyer, D-Md., will try to add a pay raise amendment to the 2002 Treasury-Postal appropriations bill at a House Appropriations Committee meeting Tuesday morning. If approved and signed into law, the amendment would force President Bush to give federal employees a higher raise than he has proposed. Bush proposed a 3.6 percent average raise for federal employees in his 2002 budget plan. The Hoyer amendment would make civilian raises more comparable with the 4.6 percent raise for military personnel the Bush administration has proposed. Bush has also proposed giving additional targeted raises to military personnel that would boost increases to between 5 percent and 10 percent for service members, depending on their rank. The Bush administration contends that civilian employees have seen a number of recent benefits enhancements--including pre-tax health insurance premiums and reduced retirement program paycheck reductions--that justify a raise 1 percentage point lower than the raise for military personnel. Hoyer said the conversion of health premiums to pre-tax income does not justify a lower raise. "This amendment is a matter of fairness to federal employees," Hoyer said in a statement. "In addition to pay that is far from competitive with the private sector, federal employees have had to absorb rapidly increasing health care premiums over the past three years." The House versions of the Agriculture and Transportation appropriations bills have assumed that the agencies that receive money through them would provide 4.6 percent average pay raises to their employees. In response to the bills, the Bush administration has reiterated its call for a 3.6 percent raise. "We believe that civilian employees are already benefiting from several recent enhancements to their compensation package. We do not believe that military pay and civilian pay raises should necessarily be automatically linked. We will continue to review federal pay policy annually, and evaluate military and civilian pay raise policies on the basis of the particular circumstances applicable to each (for example, recruiting and retention needs), consistent with prudent use of taxpayers' dollars," the Bush administration's statements on the bills said. The administration estimates that Hoyer's proposed raise hike would cost $900 million. But Rep. C.W. "Bill" Young, R-Fla., chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, indicated last week that he would support Hoyer's amendment. Washington-area lawmakers Frank Wolf, R-Va., and Jim Moran, D-Va., who support a 4.6 percent civilian raise, are also on the appropriations committee.