Payroll-tax deal includes pension contribution hike for new federal
employees
Hazel Bradford
Published: February 16, 2012 - Pensions & Investments
Newly hired federal employees will contribute more to their defined benefit
pension plan under a deal to extend a payroll tax cut and unemployment benefits
reached in Congress on Thursday.
Under the agreement expected to be approved by both chambers Friday, new
federal hires would contribute 3.1% of their pay to the $411.9 billion Federal
Employees Retirement System, Washington. Current federal workers pay 0.8% of
their salaries.
Some of the $15 billion needed to pay for the extensions would come from the
higher pension contributions. Last-minute negotiations by Sen. Ben Cardin,
D-Md., and Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., prevented the contribution hike from
also being applied to current employees.
Colleen M. Kelley, president of the National Treasury Employees Union, which
represents 150,000 federal workers in 31 agencies, argued in a statement that
higher contributions on top of two years of pay freezes amount to ga steep pay
cuth and warned that higher contribution demands for FERS would have a negative
impact on voluntary contributions to the $302 billion Thrift Savings Plan,
Washington.
gWe will find over time another generation of workers not fully able to fund
their retirement. For our nation, this is shortsighted in the extreme,h Ms.
Kelley said.
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