Congress

  • Preliminary figures suggest next year's benefit increase will be roughly 1.5 percent, according to an analysis by The Associated Press. The increase will be small because consumer prices, as measured by the government, haven't gone up much in the past year.

    October 14, 2013
  • The success of the U.S. private sector is connected to a healthy U.S. public sector, and we are letting our public sector deteriorate, says David Bray, CIO of the FCC.

    October 14, 2013
  • Federal employees who are "excepted" from furloughs have remained on the job despite the government shutdown, which is now stretching into its third week. OPM updated its shutdown guidance Friday to include instructions on how to handle "brief or intermittent unpaid absences" by excepted federal employees. Overall, OPM has made more than a dozen changes to its shutdown guidance since congressional appropriations for fiscal 2014 lapsed two weeks ago.

    October 14, 2013
  • When a Washington based web solution firm received an email from a furloughed fed looking for temporary work, the firm immediately jumped on the idea to create a website with job postings for freelance work. From idea to execution, unfurlough.us was launched in just five hours.

    October 14, 2013
  • Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell spoke by phone Sunday but failed to agree on a deal to raise the nation's borrowing authority above the $16.7 trillion debt limit or reopen a government still shuttered on its 14th day.

    October 14, 2013
  • Evan Lesser, founder and director of Clearance Jobs.com, will discuss the impact of the government shutdown on contractors and employees with security clearances. October 11, 2013

    October 11, 2013
  • A new staff report from the Senate Commerce Committee highlights some of the ways in which the government shutdown is throwing sand in the gears of the private economy. But the authors also point to several ways in which federal furloughs are jeopardizing public safety.

    October 11, 2013
  • With the shutdown of the federal government heading into its third week, Federal News Radio has prepared this snapshot of how federal agencies, programs, employees and contractors are faring.

    October 11, 2013
  • Millions of federal retirees will have to wait to find out the size of next year's cost-of-living adjustment. The Labor Department says it won't report inflation statistics on time this month, which will delay the Social Security Administration's COLA calculation.

    October 11, 2013
  • For every day that the government shutdown drags on, federal managers face a potentially growing morale crisis in the federal-employee ranks. For federal managers, returning from the shutdown, however, will offer them the opportunity to refocus on the "federal brand," the set of ideals and sense of mission that the federal government is uniquely suited to offer.

    October 11, 2013
  • Opening some agencies while keeping others shut down is an unsustainable exercise, says Jeff Neal, former chief human capital officer at the Department of Homeland Security.

    October 11, 2013
  • Nearly all of the Defense Department's civilians are now working, despite the government shutdown. Many members of Congress believe none of those civilians should have been furloughed to begin with. DoD remains unsure how to address contractors under the Pay Our Military Act.

    October 11, 2013
  • For furloughed feds who have lost track of time, today is Friday. That's official. And Monday is Columbus Day, one of the the first government holidays to hit during a shutdown, says Senior Correspondent Mike Causey. So what happens to people who don't work, and what about those who must work? Do people get paid? And if so, how much and when?

    October 11, 2013
  • House Republicans are offering to pass legislation to avert a default and end the 11-day partial government shutdown as part of a framework that would include cuts in benefit programs, officials said Friday. Republicans also seek changes in the three-year-old health care law known as Obamacare as part of an end to an impasse that has roiled financial markets and idled 350,000 federal workers. President Barack Obama has insisted he will not negotiate with Republicans over federal spending - or anything else - until the government is reopened and the $16.7 debt limit raised to avert the possibility of default.

    October 10, 2013