ABSTRACT
KEYNOTE: The Great Pay Comparability Debate It has always been assumed that public sector wages would lag behind the private sector. This assumption was tied to the practice of providing a strong benefit package along with job tenure to attract and retain public servants (since wages would always be linked politically to salaries offered to elected officials in the executive office or legislative branch). In the twentieth century, government studies would be conducted comparing public and private sector compensation levels to ensure that governments would at least keep pace with the private sector increases. This
practice of ensuring that public sector salaries and benefits were somewhat equitable and in line with pay levels for similar private sector work is called the comparability principle. At the federal level, this was mandated by law with the requirement that the President’s Pay Agent (the heads of OPM, OMB, and DOL) make determinations about white collar salary levels in terms of annual pay increase recommendations. Politically, however, these determinations would more often than not be set aside by Presidentially imposed alternative pay rates that would determine how much federal salaries would be increased annually.
