The good news is that federal white-collar workers are due their largest pay raise in years.

The bad news is that it’s only 1.3 percent. And of that amount, only 1 percentage point will be across-the-board, meaning you’ll get the same whether you ride the subway to your IRS office in Manhattan or ride a horse on Border Patrol in Texas or Arizona. The remainder, the 0.3 percent,  will go toward locality pay. That means that some of you will get more, some less depending on — you guessed it — your locality.

Locality pay is one of the great mysteries contained within the 1990 federal pay law.  Although approved by a Democratic Congress and signed by a Republican President (George H.W. Bush), it has never been fully implemented. Mostly ignored, starved  or massaged by Presidents Bill Clinton, George Bush and Barack Obama. The law was designed to close the pay “gap” between feds and private sector employees doing the same jobs. Critics contend there is no gap. Supporters or the original law (FEPCA) say the gap is wider now than when the catch up pay plan became law.

What is clear is that most big cities, and many smaller places that are major federal job centers, are in the locality pay group.  Those places outside of locality pay are known as RUS, which stands for the Rest of the United States.

Locality pay raises are determined by a complex process known only to few government experts and, possibly,  the Great Spirit.  Most who are in-the-know agree that whenever there is a locality pay adjustment, it isn’t enough.  Bottom line is each time there is a pay raise, with an accompanying locality adjustment, some people get more than others.  For instance:

Although it tops the list in number of federal workers — and high grade federal workers — the Washington, D.C., metro area is not where Uncle Sam pays top dollar. A GS 7 in the D.C. area makes anywhere from $43,057 to $55,970; GS 11, $63,722 to $82,840 and a GS 14 gets $107,325 to $139,523.

If those same workers moved from the D.C. area to San Francisco, their pay will go up to between $46,846 to $60,895 for the GS  7. The GS 14’s range would increase to $116,768 to $151,799.

A GS 7 living in RUS (outside a locality pay area) is paid between $39,570 to $51,437. A GS 11 in RUS earns $58,562 to $76,131 and a GS 14 is paid $98,633 to $128,223, depending on his or her step.

Feds in Houston, New York, Los Angeles and San Jose also make more than workers in the Washington area, or than their GS counterparts in Buffalo, Raleigh-Durham or Cincinnati or Louisville.

To see what federal pay scales look at on a city-by-city basis, click here and remember, the grass is always greener.

Nearly Useless Factoid

While the leaves of Kentucky Bluegrass, which adorns many lawns in the U.S., appear to be green in color, the blue in the plant’s name refers to the small cluster of blue flowers that appear when the grass grows to its full height of 2 to 3 feet.

Source: Wonderopolis

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