President Clinton Wednesday signed into law a 4.8 percent pay raise for federal employees as part of the fiscal 2000 Treasury-Postal appropriations bill.
The raise for civilians is the same as the 4.8 percent raise for military personnel included in the fiscal 2000 defense authorization bill.
High-level federal executives, who in recent years have more often than not received no raise because Congress has denied itself one, can also celebrate the Treasury-Postal bill. It did not include a provision freezing congressional and political appointee pay. That means the cap on Senior Executive Service pay will go up 3.4 percent next year.
President Clinton originally proposed a 4.4 percent pay raise for civilians in 2000, but Rep. Steny Hoyer, D-Md., convinced lawmakers to push the raise up to 4.8 percent during House-Senate negotiations over the bill.
Congress also included permanent early retirement authority in the Treasury-Postal bill. The government's early out authority was set to expire on Sept. 30, 1999.
Other federal pay, benefits and management provisions in the Treasury-Postal bill include:
- Requiring agencies to reimburse federal managers and other professionals for half the cost of professional liability insurance. Previously, agencies could offer the reimbursements, but were not required to.
- Boosting the President's pay from $200,000 a year to $400,000 a year when the next President takes office.
- Allowing agencies to subsidize the cost of child care in federal facilities for low-income workers.
- Prohibiting abortion coverage under the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, but requiring coverage of contraceptives.
- Establishing a chief financial officer in the Executive Office of the President when the next administration takes office.
- Requiring the Treasury Department to create a Web site allowing taxpayers to generate an itemized receipt showing the allocation of their taxes among major federal spending categories.
- Requiring the General Services Administration to modify its procedures for determining per diem rates to assure that next year's per diems determination "accurately reflects the cost of federal travel."
- Offering buyouts of up to $25,000 for employees of the Office of the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration through Jan. 1, 2003.
- Offering buyouts of up to $25,000 for employees of the Chicago Financial Center of Treasury's Financial Management Service until Jan. 31, 2000.