Next Step: Pay and Benefits Cuts?

My colleagues at National Journal have posted a slideshow on winners and losers in the debt ceiling deal.

Winners include veterans and Social Security recipients, whose benefits are explicitly protected from across-the-board cuts in the work of the congressional super-committee tasked with finding $1.8 trillion in deficit reduction over 10 years. Losers include the Defense Department, which could be in for steep cuts if the committee and Congress fail to approve spending reductions.

Not listed are federal employees, but they are almost certainly losers. There are no guarantees in the deal that federal pay and benefits won't be cut, and indications are that the subject is likely to be on the agenda of the committee. After all, Democrats explicitly put pay and benefits on the table in debt negotiations months ago.