In the waning days of his administration, President Barack Obama officially authorized a 2.1 percent pay raise for civilian employees in 2017.

The executive order, which the president signed Dec. 27, makes the alternative pay adjustments official for the next year. This follows Obama’s Dec. 8 letter to Congress, in which he directed agencies to give civilian workers a pay raise in line with that of Defense Department employees.

This executive order supersedes the one he signed Nov. 29, which called for a 1.6 percent raise that included a locality adjustment.

Federal employees looking for more details on their specific 2017 salary can find updated pay adjustment tables, including locality raises, from the Office of Personnel Management here.

An OPM memo also notes that the 2013 pay freeze on the vice president and some senior officials will continue through the beginning of the year. Because Congress passed a continuing resolution that holds agency funding at fiscal 2016 levels through Apr. 28, the pay freeze for those political appointees will continue until lawmakers suggest and pass an alternative.

In addition, acting OPM Director Beth Cobert approved a 1 percent raise for roughly 40,000 employees covered under special pay rates. The decision comes after OPM’s annual special pay rate review. Because no agency made an alternative request to adjust the special rates, OPM will increase all special rate pay tables.

“Based on the 2016 annual review of GS special rates, I have approved a 1 percent increase for all Title 5 special rate tables equal to the 1 percent increase in GS base rates,” Cobert wrote in a Dec. 27 memo. “Both the increased GS base rates and the increased GS special rates will be effective on the first day of the first applicable pay period beginning on or after Jan. 1, 2017.”

OPM may sometimes set higher special pay rates as an incentive to recruit or retain employees in certain occupations or specialties or workers in a remote location or with undesirable working conditions.

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