Since both the House and Senate spending bills have not addressed the 2023 federal pay raise, it is mostly likely that the increase for active federal employees will be 4.6% next year — a figure the White House originally proposed in March.
The Federal Salary Council — a group of advisors consisting of representatives from federal employee unions and presidential appointees — last week projected the 4.6 percent raise would include a 4.1 percent across-the-board increase with the remainder allocated into locality pay.
New Locality Pay Areas and Adjustments Recommended for 2023
The Salary Council also recommended a list of new locality pay areas and adjustments that would improve the salaries of nearly 30,000 federal employees:
- establishing Fresno, CA, and Spokane, WA, as new locality pay areas, impacting approximately 11,400 GS employees
- adding new pay locality areas for Reno, Nevada, and Rochester, New York, impacting roughly 4,800 GS employees
Additionally, the council recommended making adjustments to the following:
- Emporia, Virginia, and Greensville County, Virginia, to the Richmond, Virginia, locality
- Dukes and Nantucket counties in Massachusetts to the Boston locality
- Huron County, Michigan, to the Detroit locality
- Pacific and San Juan counties in Washington to the Seattle locality
The Federal Salary Council’s annual recommendations are sent to the President’s Pay Agent — a group which consists of directors of the Office of Management and Budget and the Office of Personnel Management and the Secretary of Labor. If the recommendations are adopted and the required rule making proceeds, they could become effective in January 2023.
“These recommendations would put additional money into the hands of federal employees whose pay lags behind their coworkers,” AFGE National President Everett Kelley said. “I call on Office of Management and Budget Director Shalanda Young, Office of Personnel Management Director Kiran Ahuja, and Labor Secretary Marty Walsh – who together serve as the President’s Pay Agent – to accept these recommendations.”
The final 2023 federal pay raise figures will not likely be issued until December when the White House issues an executive order and the Office of Personnel Management publishes the official 2023 federal pay tables.