FederalDaily - August 9, 2005
Military Eyes Performance Pay
Pay-for-performance may be hitting the military as well as civilians. Adm.
Donald L. Pilling, chairman of the Defense Advisory Committee on Military Compensation,
said the committee concluded it might be a good idea to someday "change
the pay tables so that you get paid for your length of service in a pay grade." This
would replace the system of being paid based on length of service. Using pay-for-performance
would mean that exceptional enlisted servicemembers who are promoted ahead
of their peers could be more fairly compensated for their efforts, Pilling
said. The current enlisted pay system doesn't really reward high performers
of the same rank, he said. The committee's interim report is due in October
and its final report is due to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld in April.
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FBI Technology Progresses
The FBI announced that it has completed deployment of its Public Key Infrastructure
(PKI). PKI is supposed to help the FBI move towards an automated, paperless
case management system. PKI was deployed to 33,000 desktop computers and has
made advanced security features available to 28,000 FBI employees, taskforce
members and contract employees. The FBI said the PKI capability was delivered
ahead of schedule and under budget. PKI provides individuals with a digital
identity, eliminating the need for "wet" signature hard copies. It
also allows for digital signature approval. Further, it protects the FBI's
computer systems and the information stored on them by requiring users to prove
their identity twice, through the use of their smartcards and personal passwords.
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Tax Break for Death Gratuities
Rep. Walter B. Jones, R-N.C., introduced H.R. 3478, a bill to amend tax laws
to permit military death gratuities to be contributed to certain tax-preferred
accounts. A death gratuity is a lump sum payment paid to survivors of servicemembers
whose death resulted from combat-related circumstances including armed conflict,
hazardous service, performance of duty under conditions simulating war, or
incurred in a combat operation or zone. Current tax law limits the amount that
recipients of the death gratuity can place in tax-preferred accounts such as
Roth IRAs, health savings accounts, Archer Medical Savings Accounts or Coverdell
Education Savings Accounts. The new bill would change that to allow recipients
to contribute up to the full amount of the gratuity payment to any one of those
accounts by removing the caps placed on these accounts.
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HealthierFeds Meeting Coming in September
All federal agency staff who work with federal employee health issues are
invited to attend the Office of Personnel Management’s next HealthierFeds
working group on September 20 from 9:00-12:30 a.m. For more information, e-mail worklife@opm.gov.
Also, there is information at www.opm.gov/healthierfeds/.
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