Art of the Steal: More Money Out of Fed Pockets as Insurance Rates Spike AGAIN Under Trump
October 19, 2020
Categories:
Benefits, The Insider
Current and retired federal workers will pay 4.9% more in health insurance premiums on average next year – another in a series of rate hikes that has shifted costs onto feds and wiped out recent wage increases, putting government employees further behind.
Since President Trump has been in office, the average premium for current and retired federal employees has increased a whopping 18.1%.
“This shameful rate hike continues a pattern of large increases and cost shifting onto employees throughout President Trump’s administration,” said AFGE President Everett Kelley. “The president claims to be one of the best dealmakers on the planet, yet when it comes to negotiating these health insurance rates, he gives private health insurers whatever they ask for and sticks current and retired federal workers with the bulk of the bill.”
The government continues to shift costs for health insurance onto the backs of federal employees and retirees, forcing them to either pay up or drop out – another sign of an economic system and administration that fails to work for working people.
The 4.9% average rate hike will swallow up the 1% pay adjustment President Trump has proposed giving federal workers in January, as well as the 1.3% cost-of-living adjustment federal retirees will receive in their Social Security, FERS and CSRS checks next year.
Federal workers also will be hit with twice as much in Social Security tax in the first quarter of next year, thanks to a Trump scheme that forced feds into a payroll tax deferral scam that was widely panned by the private sector and members of Trump’s own party.
The 2020 Federal Employees Health Benefits open season will run from Nov. 9 through Dec.14, 2020.
