President Obama in his fiscal year 2014 budget request, released April 10, proposed a 1 percent pay increase for federal employees, but also called on federal workers hired prior to Jan. 1, 2013, to contribute an additional 1.2 percent of their salaries toward their retirements.

Currently, federal employees hired before Jan. 1 contribute 0.8 percent of their salaries toward their retirements. The proposed increase would mean they would pay a total of 2 percent of their salaries toward their retirements. For a federal employee with an annual salary of $100,000, for example, the change would mean that their annual retirement contribution would increase from $800 to $2,000.

Federal employees hired after Dec. 31, 2012, already are paying 3.1 percent of their salaries toward their retirements under legislation signed by Obama in February 2012. The president's budget proposal would not make changes to the existing pension contributions for these employees.

In addition, the budget proposal would change the way federal retirement increases are calculated through a proposed move to the "chained" consumer price index (CPI), which would affect the way a variety of retirement benefits are calculated. The chained CPI rises more slowly than the consumer price index for urban wage earners and clerical workers (CPI-W)--a measure of inflation used by the Labor Department's Bureau of Labor Statistics--because it takes changes to consumers' spending habits into account.

The proposals to increase retirement contributions and to move to a chained CPI for calculating retirement increases in particular were panned by a variety of groups representing federal employees and retirees.

"[W]e are troubled that federal employees continue to play a lopsided role in deficit reduction strategies, sending the message that those who serve our nation day in and day out are responsible for our government's spending problem," Patricia Niehaus, president of the Federal Managers Association, said in an April 10 statement.

In other public sector news:

• The U.S. Postal Service announced it was abandoning for the time being its plan to end Saturday mail delivery, but it urged Congress to approve legislation that would allow it to move to a five-day mail delivery schedule in the future. 

• The Merit Systems Protection Board ruled that a federal agency may not fire a successfully performing employee for refusing to accept a directed reassignment without showing that her removal was in the interest of promoting the agency's efficiency of service. 

• Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad (R) announced that nonunion state employees will receive two 1 percent salary increases over the next two years, but the "nonrecurring" increases will not raise their base wage and will be accompanied by a requirement that the employees pay 20 percent of the cost of their health insurance premiums. 

• New Jersey lawmakers approved legislation (A. 2878) that would limit employer access to the log-in credentials of personal social media accounts of employees and job seekers. If Gov. Chris Christie (R) signs the bill, New Jersey will join California, Illinois, Maryland, and Michigan in limiting employer access to social media accounts.