Estimated 2025 GS Pay Scale | FedSmith.com (2024)

The 2025 federal pay raise is one step closer to being finalized after President Bidenissued his alternative pay plan letterat the end of August outlining the amounts he wants for next year’s pay raise for federal employees.

The president proposed a 2% raise for federal employees in March and reiterated it in his alternative pay plan letter. Assuming that is the final amount, the 2% 2025 federal pay raise will be divided between an average of 0.3% for locality pay areas and 1.7% as an across-the-board pay raise, according to what Bidenoutlined in the letter.

Anticipating the percentage increase for how each GS locality pay area will fare in 2025 would be futile. When the figures are finalized, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) will provide a copy of the 2025 General Schedule (GS) pay tables, including 2025 GS locality pay. This usually happens in December.

The Annual Federal Pay Raise Process

The Biden administrationproposed a 2% 2025 federal pay raise in March. That is the first step in a complex process. Congress has thus far not indicated any interest in approving a different amount.

The next step occurred on August 30, 2024, when President Bidenissued an alternative pay plan letter for the 2025 federal pay raise.

This letter states:

Title 5, United States Code, authorizes me to implement alternative plans for pay adjustments for civilian Federal employees covered by the General Schedule and certain other pay systems if, because of “national emergency or serious economic conditions affecting the general welfare,” I view the increases that would otherwise take effect as inappropriate.

Congress could also pass legislation to determine a different pay raise amount. As that has not been done earlier this year, and there were several opportunities for Congress to do so in legislation that was under consideration, that is possible but unlikely to happen for the 2025 pay raise for federal employees.

Estimated 2025 GS Pay Scale Table

FedSmith has created this 2025 GS pay scale table of the base pay rates to provide readers with some early information.

While we will not know the percentage increase for each locality pay area until later this year, it is possible to calculate an estimate of how the base pay rates will be changed for each GS pay grade before the final locality pay percentages are calculated.

GradeStep1Step2Step3Step4Step5Step6Step7Step8Step9Step 10WGI
122360231102385324594253362577026506272472727727970VARIES
225142257402657327277275852839729208300203083131643VARIES
327434283482926230176310913200532919338343474835662914
4307953182132847338733489935926369523797839004400301026
5344543560236750378993904740195413434249143639447881148
6384073968740968422484352944809460894737048650499311280
7426794410245525469484837149793512165263954062554841423
8472654884050416519915356655142567175829259868614431575
9522055394555685574255916560905626456438566125678651740
10574895940561321632376515367069689857090172817747331916
11631636526867373694787158473689757947789980004821102105
12757067823080753832768579988322908469336995892984152523
13900259302696027990281020301050311080321110331140341170353001
141063821099291134751170211205671241141276601312061347531382993546
151251331293031334741376451418161459861501571543281584981626694171

This table shows an estimated 2025 GS pay scale based on the expected 2025 federal pay raise of 2% with a 2025 General Schedule (GS) base pay raise of 1.7%.

Why only 1.7% and not 2%? 2% will probably be the average raise, and when the annual federal pay raise is issued each year, it usually includes an across-the-board base pay increase and an amount set aside for locality pay. Since the president proposed a base pay increase of 1.7% with 0.3% for locality pay in hisalternative pay plan letter, we used the 1.7% figure for the estimated 2025 GS pay scale table.

Note that the 2025 GS pay table will not be finalized until OPM issues the final figures after the 2025 federal pay raise is finalized with an executive order. In most years, this occurs in December. Last year, the Executive Order implementing the2024 federal pay raise was issuedon December 21st.

This means the final figures will be adjusted. The final adjustment will reflect the larger increase for areas that usually receive large pay raises. Typically, this includes higher pay raises for larger cities because of locality pay. Here are the2024 GS pay tablesfor each locality.

2025 GS Locality Pay Areas

The Federal Salary Council (FSC) proposed adding about 15,000 federal employees from the “Rest of the U.S.” to existing locality pay areas for 2025. Being added to a locality pay area usuallyresults in higher payfor impacted employees.

FSC is recommending the Pay Agent add Wyandot County, OH, to the Columbus,
OH, locality pay area and Yuma County, AZ, to the Phoenix, AZ, locality pay area. These recommendations do not create new locality pay areas. In this case, they are adding employees to existing pay areas using various techniques to reduce employees in the “Rest of the U.S.” and add more to higher-paying locality pay areas.

Note that this is a proposal only at this point and has not been finalized, but it is possible that impacted federal employees could find themselves in a new locality pay area in the future.

Existing GS Locality Pay Areas

The current 2024 General Schedule locality pay area definitions are as follows:

  • Alaska
  • Albany-Schenectady, NY-MA
  • Albuquerque-Santa Fe-Las Vegas, NM
  • Atlanta–Athens-Clarke County–Sandy Springs, GA-AL
  • Austin-Round Rock-Georgetown, TX
  • Birmingham-Hoover-Talladega, AL
  • Boston-Worcester-Providence, MA-RI-NH-CT-ME-VT
  • Buffalo-Cheektowaga-Olean, NY
  • Burlington-South Burlington-Barre, VT
  • Charlotte-Concord, NC-SC
  • Chicago-Naperville, IL-IN-WI
  • Cincinnati-Wilmington-Maysville, OH-KY-IN
  • Cleveland-Akron-Canton, OH-PA
  • Colorado Springs, CO
  • Columbus-Marion-Zanesville, OH
  • Corpus Christi-Kingsville-Alice, TX
  • Dallas-Fort Worth, TX-OK
  • Davenport-Moline, IA-IL
  • Dayton-Springfield-Kettering, OH
  • Denver-Aurora, CO
  • Des Moines-Ames-West Des Moines, IA
  • Detroit-Warren-Ann Arbor, MI
  • Fresno-Madera-Hanford, CA
  • Harrisburg-Lebanon, PA
  • Hartford-East Hartford, CT-MA
  • Hawaii
  • Houston-The Woodlands, TX
  • Huntsville-Decatur, AL-TN
  • Indianapolis-Carmel-Muncie, IN
  • Kansas City-Overland Park-Kansas City, MO-KS
  • Laredo, TX
  • Las Vegas-Henderson, NV-AZ
  • Los Angeles-Long Beach, CA
  • Miami-Port St. Lucie-Fort Lauderdale, FL
  • Milwaukee-Racine-Waukesha, WI
  • Minneapolis-St. Paul, MN-WI
  • New York-Newark, NY-NJ-CT-PA
  • Omaha-Council Bluffs-Fremont, NE-IA
  • Palm Bay-Melbourne-Titusville, FL
  • Philadelphia-Reading-Camden, PA-NJ-DE-MD
  • Phoenix-Mesa, AZ
  • Pittsburgh-New Castle-Weirton, PA-OH-WV
  • Portland-Vancouver-Salem, OR-WA
  • Raleigh-Durham-Cary, NC
  • Reno-Fernley, NV
  • Richmond, VA
  • Rochester-Batavia-Seneca Falls, NY
  • Sacramento-Roseville, CA-NV
  • San Antonio-New Braunfels-Pearsall, TX
  • San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad, CA
  • San Jose-San Francisco-Oakland, CA
  • Seattle-Tacoma, WA
  • Spokane-Spokane Valley-Coeur d’Alene, WA-ID
  • St. Louis-St. Charles-Farmington, MO-IL
  • Tucson-Nogales, AZ
  • Virginia Beach-Norfolk, VA-NC
  • Washington-Baltimore-Arlington, DC-MD-VA-WV-PA
  • Rest of U.S.

2024 GS Pay Scale

The2024 GS pay scalewas based on an overall average pay raise of 5.2%. The2024 federal pay raisealso included an across-the-board base pay increase of 4.7% with 0.5% for locality pay.

The average federal employee salary as of February 2024 is $106,363 according to the Office of Personnel Management.

© 2024 Ian Smith. All rights reserved. This article may not be reproduced without express written consent from Ian Smith.

Estimated 2025 GS Pay Scale | FedSmith.com (2024)
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