FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 15, 2017
June 15, 2017
Contact:
Tim Kauffman
202-639-6405/202-374-6491
[email protected]
New Video: 4 ways Trump’s budget slashes income for federal workers and retirees
Budget delivers huge tax breaks to CEOs and wealthy on backs of federal workers, retirees
WASHINGTON –A new video from the American Federation of Government Employees illustrates how President Trump’s proposed budget would cut wages for current federal workers and slash federal retirement benefits for current and future retirees.
“It takes money out of your paycheck right now and cuts the benefits you were promised for retirement,” the narrator intones. “Most employees will be forced to pay nearly eight times more out of every paycheck for a worse pension benefit than you receive today.”
Specifically, the budget would:
- Increase current workers’ out-of-pocket payments toward their pensions from the 0.8 percent most workers pay today to 7 percent over the course of six years. That’s nearly an eight-fold increase – not including payments workers already make into the Thrift Savings Plan and Social Security.
- Reduce pension benefits for future retirees by averaging their highest five years of salary, instead of the highest three years.
- Eliminate annual cost-of-living adjustments for current and future retirees under the Federal Employees Retirement System, and cut the COLA for retirees under the older Civil Service Retirement System by 0.5 percent from the current formula.
- Eliminate supplemental annuity payments to employees who retire before age 62, such as law enforcement agents, firefighters, and workers who take early outs or buyouts.
The retirement cuts alone total about $149 billion over a decade, which would be on top of $182 billion in cuts to federal employees’ pay and benefits since 2010.
“President Trump’s budget continues this race to the bottom by penalizing the working-class people who serve and protect their fellow Americans,” AFGE National President J. David Cox Sr. said.
“And adding insult to injury, the money saved from cutting federal workers’ retirement would go toward a massive set of tax cuts to further enrich corporations and wealthy individuals.”
The video ends by asking current and retired federal workers to call their lawmakers and voice their opposition to budget cuts that threaten their financial security.
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