Feds in 2024 made almost a quarter less than their private sector peers

Federal employees in 2024 on average earned 24.72% less than their counterparts in similar private sector jobs, according to a new report from the Federal Salary Council that is based on Bureau of Labor Statistics data. 

The council, which is composed of presidentially appointed federal human resources experts and public union representatives, advises on issues related to government employee compensation. Doreen Greenwald, the national president of the National Treasury Employees Union and a council member, argued the data shows agencies need to provide higher salaries. 

“It is a loss to our country when highly qualified professionals turn away from critical public service jobs because the paychecks can’t keep up with for-profit corporations,” Greenwald said in a statement. “We call on Congress and the White House to make sure federal salaries don’t lose ground in 2025.”

This year’s pay disparity is a slight improvement from 2023 when the council reported a 27.54% difference. NTEU attributed the improvement to the average 5.2% pay raise that federal employees received in 2024, which was the largest increase in more than 40 years. 

Feds are set to receive a 2% average increase next year, which government unions and some Democrats have criticized as being too low. 

The council released the disparity data on Monday in conjunction with a meeting during which the body recommended that Biden administration officials establish new locality pay areas in Kennewick-Richland-Walla Walla, Wash., and Syracuse-Auburn, N.Y. Both areas had a pay disparity exceeding the rest of the U.S. by more than 10 percentage points on average over the three-year period between March 2022 and March 2024. 

Establishing these areas would affect approximately 4,368 general schedule employees, according to the report.  

The council noted that the area around Dothan, Ala., technically qualifies to be established as a locality pay area, but did not recommend doing so because of anomalous data that distorted the results. 

Also, the council reiterated its suggestion from earlier this year that officials add Wyandot County, Ohio, to the Columbus, Ohio, locality pay area and Yuma County, Ariz., to the Phoenix, Ariz., area. Due to upcoming adjustments to locality pay areas so that they better conform to the Office of Management and Budget’s latest map of metropolitan and combined statistical areas, the two counties would practically be surrounded by locations already included in such areas. In these cases, it’s standard for such counties to then be added to a locality pay area.