President Bush proposed a 2.9 percent pay increase for civilian workers and a 3.4 percent pay boost for military personnel in fiscal 2009, according to recent budget documents. Last year, the president proposed 3 percent raises for both service members and civilians. Congress ended up approving 3.5 percent for both groups.
The proposed pay raises rebuff calls for military-civilian pay parity from several lawmakers. A bipartisan group of House lawmakers had sent a letter to the president, asking him to incorporate the principle of equal raises for service members and civilians in his budget request. "We cannot express strongly enough the importance of continuing the tradition of pay parity between military and civilian employees in the coming fiscal year," the lawmakers wrote. "As we fight the war on terrorism at home and abroad, both the armed services and the federal civilian workforce are integral in fulfilling the role of government for the American people."
A portion of the proposed 2.9 percent pay hike civilian workers would receive in 2009 would be allocated for locality pay. A 2004 law mandates that military pay raises be equal to the change in the Labor Department's annual Employment Cost Index for the private sector's wages. From September 2006 to September 2007, the change in the ECI was 3.4 percent. The absence of pay parity in the budget proposal is similar to 2006, when Bush proposed a 2.3 percent pay increase for civilian workers and a 3.1 percent boost for military personnel. Congress overruled Bush and granted 3.1 percent to both groups in the fiscal 2006 omnibus spending measure. In recent years Congress consistently has ignored the president's recommendations and given both groups the same raise. Federal labor unions are likely to push for that result this year, too.