In a State of the Union address that ranged from job creation to education reform, President Obama also called for restoring trust in government, streamlining the federal budget, and extending debt forgiveness to students who spend 10 years in public service careers. Saying "no one should go broke because they choose to go to college," Obama proposed a program that would ...

WASHINGTON - From federal government clerk positions to grocery store cashiers, the competition for jobs is phenomenal. Applications for all types of positions are flooding in. "We are pretty much overwhelmed with the number of applications that we are receiving for every job posting," says Deputy Associate Director of the Center for Talent and Capacity Policy at the U.S. Office of ...

President Obama signed the Defense Authorization bill on Wednesday, which means many federal employees will see changes in their pay & benefits. On this week's Your Turn, Mike Causey spoke with Jessica Klement of the Federal Managers Association, who broke down some of the more significant aspects of the bill. Listen to the audio at FederalNewsRadio "[It] will credit FERS employees ...

One of the most common complaints among federal employees who enforce Uncle Sam's laws and regulations is that there are too few of them to properly protect the public. But one area where one would expect that not to be the case, given our nation's recent history, is border protection. Yet testimony before a House subcommittee Thursday painted a picture of ...

Long-sought changes to the pay and benefits structure for current and former federal employees await President Obama's signature. The defense authorization bill passed by the Senate on Thursday night included alterations to benefits and practices first announced earlier this month. Perhaps the biggest change is that members of the Federal Employees Retirement System will be able to get credit for unused ...

A POGO investigation has found that many state and local governments with laws limiting contractors’ campaign contributions (meant to reduce the influence of private interests in the public contracting process) are facing obstacles to enforcing these “pay-to-play” laws on stimulus-funded contracts. As a result, stimulus-funded contracts are not being subjected to this additional level of corruption prevention, a missed good-government opportunity. ...

President Obama plans to freeze locality pay rates at 2009 levels for civilian federal employees in 2010, a move that has prompted protests from government employee groups. In a letter sent to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Vice President Joe Biden on Monday, Obama said federal employees nationwide would receive a 2 percent increase in their base pay in 2010, ...

A new analysis claiming federal employees earn twice as much as their private sector counterparts is fueling the debate over pay disparities, but a comprehensive study on the issue still could be a while in coming. The analysis, conducted by USA Today, found that federal employees earned an average of $123,049 in pay and benefits in 2009 while private sector workers ...

Federal agencies are failing to maximize opportunities to make contracts competitive, often because of poor management or because officials have grown comfortable with incumbent contractors, according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office. The watchdog reviewed trends in noncompetitive contracts during the past several years and discovered a number of questionable business practices by contracting officials and program managers. ...

COLUMBIA, S.C. — A new poll shows Southerners are fretting about job loss and the economy and don't think the federal government is doing enough to address either. The Winthrop Poll of 866 respondents in 11 Southern states found the economy was the top concern of four in 10 — the same share of people who said they were concerned about ...

Washington, DC – The U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) released a government wide Strategic Plan to increase support and access for Veterans seeking employment with the Federal government. The plan is part of President Obama’s Veterans Employment Initiative, a pragmatic, straightforward approach to helping the men and women who have served our country in the military find employment as civilians ...

Federal agencies have room for improvement when it comes to assessing applicants for federal jobs, according to a new survey of government officials and observers. The report, released Thursday by the nonprofit Partnership for Public Service and PDRI, a human resources consulting firm, found government does a poor job of evaluating applicants for federal positions. During discussions with seven focus groups ...

Federal benefits payments will go exclusively electronic by 2013, the Treasury Department announced on Monday. Treasury's decision applies to all recipients of Social Security, Supplemental Security Income, Veterans Affairs, Railroad Retirement and Office of Personnel Management benefits. Enrollees will be able to choose between direct deposits and balances added to Treasury debit cards. All new program enrollees will receive their benefits ...

Applying for a job with the federal government can be a miserable experience. Announcements of vacancies are often written in arcane, incomprehensible jargon; applications can stretch for dozens of pages; one branch of an agency might not have any idea of the hiring needs of a second branch. This is not the opinion of jilted job-seekers. Instead, it was the frank ...

President Obama signed into law on Monday a 3.4 percent pay raise for service members in 2010, while federal employee unions said they would push for parity between civilian and military pay in 2011. The military pay raise, included in the fiscal 2010 Defense Appropriations Act (H.R. 3326), was 0.5 percent higher than the 2.9 percent raise Obama requested in his ...

The Defense Department's controversial pay-for-performance system is headed for repeal, and there are several ways the dismantling of the National Security Personnel System could proceed, say advocates and employee groups. The fiscal 2010 Defense authorization legislation, which is on its way to President Obama, requires the Pentagon to begin returning the 200,000 employees covered by NSPS to their previous pay systems ...

WASHINGTON - The federal government may soon mandate that you avoid your usual morning traffic headaches. Rep. Gerry Connolly, D-Va., has sponsored a bill that would require all federal agencies to allow 20 percent of their employees to telework at least one day a week. "It will improve air quality, it will improve congestion, and make for a much better quality ...

Christmas came early for some federal employees and their unions Wednesday as lawmakers delivered one of the biggest items on their wish list, repealing a controversial pay-for-performance program. The repeal of the National Security Personnel System came as part of a compromise House and Senate members announced in their negotiations over the Defense Department authorization bill. The Defense Department will maintain ...

When the 2010 pay raise kicks in later this month, white collar feds on the West Coast will continue to be at the top of the government's salary totem pole. But the gap between federal pay rates in San Francisco-Oakland-San Jose-Los Angeles will narrow thanks to bigger locality adjustments for civil servants in Boston, New York, Philadelphia and Washington-Baltimore. Under President ...

Presidential executive orders are lofty, historical documents, generally signed in White House ceremonies with pomp and circumstance. Seldom do we think of them beginning in a small town on the eastern edge of West Virginia. But it was in Shepherdstown, with a population of 803 at last count, where President Obama's latest executive order, designed to facilitate the hiring of veterans ...