An analysis of the federal pay comparability process and its implications for federal government employees in the 1980's, 1986

This study seeks to undertake an investigation of the extent to which federal government compensation policies have attempted to reduce differences between the salaries and wages of federal employees and those of their counterparts in similar positions in the private sector. In this respect, the study will attempt to determine why the federal government has found it increasing�ly difficult to bridge the gap between the salaries of its em�ployees and those of the private sector as stipulated by the Federal Pay Comparability Act of 1970. Also this study will assess the ways by which such policies can be revised to insure that federal employees enjoy similar compensation benefits as their counterparts in comparable positions in the private sector. This study concludes that the federal pay comparability process, though desirable, is fraught with major defects that need to be carefully examined and corrected for the process to serve the purpose for which it was designed. In this light, vigorous checks and balances must be introduced and en�forced in both sectors to ensure pay comparability. Also, the comparability process itself must be redefined to eliminate the confusion that currently exists between the positive and normative aspects of the process. Finally, compen�sation relationships between the public and private sectors should be reassessed periodically from a different perspective than that used in the comparability process. Taken together, this study utilized information from a vast array of sources such as books, journals, dissertations, theses, congressional documents, magazines and newspapers