Article Title: Most federal employees would get a 3.1% raise on average under this House plan
Snippet of Article: "...Most federal employees would receive a raise averaging 3.1 percent in January 2020 and the central federal personnel agency..."
Article Title: OPM Proposes Changes to Probation, Special Hiring Authorities
Snippet of Article: "...Federal employees would not gain full appeal rights until they have completed their probationary periods regardless of the..."
Article Title: Despite recent decisions, FLRA chairman insists no ‘anti-union bias’
Snippet of Article: "...The House Oversight and Reform Government Operations Subcommittee questioned FLRA Chairman Colleen Kiko about her decisions to close two of the agency’s regional offices and end formal recognition of the FLRA’s own employee union within the past year..."
Article Title: VA shooting survivor victimized by ‘bizarre’ federal worker’s comp maze
Snippet of Article: "...Since most of his cases involve postal workers, Shapiro offered the example of a carrier who needs knee replacements after spending 25 years on the job. In that time, the worker has walked 35,000 miles and climbed 7 million stairs while carrying a bag that weighs up to 70 pounds, he said.
“Do you think his job contributed to some degree to his need for knee replacement surgery?” Shapiro asked rhetorically. “Nine out of 10 people will say yes and the tenth works for the Department of Labor. I get that case denied every single day by the Department of Labor..."
Article Title: TSP investors playing it safe, or missing big gains?
Snippet of Article: "...generally pay less than any other option in the federal Thrift Savings Plan, Uncle Sam’s in-house 401K plan for active duty and retired astronauts, NASA rocket scientists, current and..."
Article Title: Trump’s Pick to Lead OPM Has an Unusual Management Record for the Job
Snippet of Article: "...the announcement turned heads among those who once worked at the FLRA, the independent agency tasked with handling labor-management disputes. Former officials at the agency were puzzled that the White House would nominate someone to the government's top HR position whose previous executive branch leadership experience was marked by an exodus of employees and ballooning case backlog. Morale at the agency, as measured by governmentwide employee survey data, was the lowest in government by the time Cabaniss left the top job there..."
Article Title: Federal Retirement Claims Continue to Surge in March, But Backlog Is Down
Snippet of Article: "...The Office of Personnel Management reported last week that the annual surge in retirements, traditionally reserved for January and February, crept into March this year, although the agency has managed to reduce the backlog of claims.
Last month, 10,048 federal employees..."
Article Title: FBI accuses wealthy parents, including celebrities, in college-entrance bribery scheme
Snippet of Article: "...Investigators allege the scheme was run largely through Key Worldwide Foundation, which ostensibly was a nonprofit but, according to the FBI, was really a conduit for bribing college employees to get rich kids into elite schools..."
Article Title: Federal Employee Union Calls Proposed Budget 'A Kick in the Teeth' to Workers
Snippet of Article: "..."It's frankly unbelievable that, given the pain federal employees have just gone through, the President is proposing massive cuts and another pay freeze. It shows a complete disconnect with the needs of the civil servants who are America's workforce.
"This budget is a kick in the teeth to the federal employees who have suffered through years of pay freezes, cuts to their benefits, and attacks on their rights at work. Federal workers have lost more than $200 billion from cuts to their pay and benefits since 2011..."
Article Title: Here’s How Much America’s Rising Income Inequality Is Costing Social Security
Snippet of Article: "...ironically, it’s America’s highest earners—those who can most readily afford to contribute—whom policymakers have chosen to give a break. In 2019, every dollar they earn above the payroll tax cap of $132,900 will escape Social Security payroll taxes entirely.
As a result, while roughly 94 percent of workers contributed the full 12.4 percent of their annual earnings toward Social Security taxes..."
Article Title: Amazon will pay $0 in taxes on $11,200,000,000 in profit for 2018
Snippet of Article: "...According to a report from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP), Amazon (AMZN) will pay nothing in federal income taxes for the second year in a row.
Thanks to the new Tax Cuts and..."
Article Title: IRS is now accepting tax returns, but some deductions are no longer allowed
Snippet of Article: "...Tax filing season is officially underway and starting Monday, the IRS will start accepting tax returns.
This year, you may want to file sooner rather than later, as reported by CBS..."
Article Title: AFGE Urges Workers to Join Shutdown Lawsuit to Be Made Whole From Loss of Income
Snippet of Article: "...All federal employees who are classified as non-exempt under the Fair Labor Standards Act, have been deemed "excepted" by their agency, and worked for any amount of time on or after Dec. 22, 2018 without being paid are eligible to join the AFGE lawsuit.
To join the lawsuit..."
Article Title: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was the only House Democrat who voted against a bill to end the shutdown
Snippet of Article: "...Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) was the only Democrat in the House of Representatives to vote against a short-term spending bill to end the partial government shutdown on Wednesday, because it would allocate funds to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency (ICE), which she campaigned on eliminating..."
Article Title: Now Pelosi Owns the Shutdown
Snippet of Article: "...Donald Trump shrewdly flipped the table on Nancy Pelosi in the government shutdown standoff. He has now proposed a grand bargain on immigration: legalization of some 1 million so-called Dreamers..."
Article Title: Largest Federal Employee Union Files Amended Shutdown Lawsuit
Snippet of Article: "...After the 2013 shutdown, approximately 25,000 essential federal employees, represented by Heidi Burakiewicz, now a partner with KCNF DC, sued the government, arguing that the Fair Labor Standards Act requires that all employees, including federal employees, be paid on time for their services. In 2014, the U.S. Court of Federal Claims agreed and, in 2017, the court held further that the employees were entitled to twice their back pay because of the violation. However, even while the government is calculating the damages to those approximately 25,000 employees, the government has not required that essential federal employees be paid on time during the current shutdown.
KCNF DC is in the process of setting up an electronic sign-up system for people to use to join the case. In the meantime, questions federal employees have about the case can be emailed to the law firm at 2018shutdownlawsuit@kcnlaw.com..."
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| TurboTax Deluxe 2018 |
Article Title: Refusal to budge on border wall shows Dems still hung up on 2016
Snippet of Article: "...Like generals fighting the last war, Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer are fixated on the last presidential election. Their refusal to let it go and get on with governing in a divided Congress is a shameful sign of how radical their party has become since Trump’s election..."
Article Title: IRS won't issue tax refunds during government shutdown
Snippet of Article: "...During a shutdown, the IRS typically doesn't perform audits, pay refunds or offer assistance to taxpayers if they have questions, especially outside of the filing season. And while some of the lights may still be on in the building, the agency is currently operating with only 12.5% of its workforce, or fewer than 10,000 federal employees.
"It does throw a little bit of wrench into things," said Kyle Pomerleau, economist at the Tax Foundation. "To the extent that individuals are relying on the refund any delay is going to be a negative..."
Article Title: Trump orders federal pay freeze for 2019
Snippet of Article: "...Military personnel, who have been funded separately, will still receive a 2.6 percent raise.
Workers unions say Trump is pouring “salt into the wound” by delivering the pay freeze as 800,000 federal workers continue to shoulder the burden of a partial government shutdown. We’re now nine days in to the political standoff between the president and Congress over Trump’s requested $5 billion for the border wall..."
Article Title: Pay, leave and other questions answered about Wednesday’s government closure
Snippet of Article: "...Full time federal employees under a standard work schedule of eight hours a day, 40 hours a week will be excused from eight hours of work on Wednesday, Margaret Weichert, acting director for the Office of Personnel Management, said Sunday in a memo to agency heads..."
Article Title: U.S. consulate in Mexico attacked with grenade, no injuries
Snippet of Article: "...Mexican authorities are investigating an apparent grenade attack on the U.S. consulate in the city of Guadalajara, officials said on Saturday, underscoring the security challenges facing Mexico’s new president..."
Article Title: 'Serial killer': US border patrol agent charged with murder of four women
Snippet of Article: "...Ortiz was arrested after the fifth woman managed to flee. State troopers found Ortiz hiding in a truck in a hotel parking lot in Laredo at around 2am on Saturday. The border city is about 145 miles south-west of San Antonio.
“We do consider this to be a serial killer..."
Article Title: Trump Thanks Saudis for Low Oil Prices Amid Uproar Over Killing
Snippet of Article: "...President Donald Trump thanked Saudi Arabia for lower oil prices one day after announcing the U.S. won’t let the murder of a journalist jeopardize relations with the kingdom.
“Oil prices getting lower. Great!” Trump said on Twitter Wednesday. “Thank you to Saudi Arabia..."
Article Title: The Highest Paid Federal Employee in America
Snippet of Article: "...CEO Bill Johnson, TVA's chief executive for the past six years, received pay, bonuses and deferred compensation in 2018 of a total of $8.1 million, up 22 percent from a year ago. Johnson is among a handful of TVA executives paid more than $2 million in compensation in fiscal 2018.
Johnson, the 64-year-old president of TVA who announced Wednesday he will retire in early 2019, is the highest paid federal employee in America..."
Article Title: 2018 Federal Benefits Open Season
Open Season is November 12 – December 10, 2018. Sign up by December 10, 2018. Please note: The Federal Benefits Open Season ends at 11:59pm Eastern Time on Monday December 10, 2018 for the Federal Employees Dental and Vision Insurance Program (FEDVIP) and the Federal Flexible Spending Account Program (FSAFEDS). Open Season for the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program (FEHB) ends at 11:59pm, in the location of your electronic enrollment system, on Monday December 10, 2018. All the resources you need to make informed decisions about your health, dental, vision, or flexible spending account benefits.Go to the Plan Comparison Tool.
Article Title: OPM: Federal Happiness Stagnated in 2018, While Survey Participation Tanked
Snippet of Article: "...federal workers’ willingness to participate in the survey fell 5 percentage points to 40.6 percent this year, despite the fact that for the first time, the survey was conducted as a census, meaning that all employees were eligible to take the survey, instead of a randomized selection..."
Article Title: Federal Employees Waiting until Later to Retire
Snippet of Article: "...The average retirement age for federal employees is continuing to rise, hitting an average of 61.8 in the 2017 fiscal year, up by a half-year over 2015, a recent OPM report shows.
At two of the largest agencies..."
Article Title: 'Suspicious Packages' Mailed To Clinton, Obama And CNN
Snippet of Article: "...The packages addressed to Clinton and Obama "were immediately identified during routine mail screening procedures as potential explosive devices and were appropriately handled as such," the Secret Service said in a statement Wednesday. "The protectees did not receive the packages nor were they at risk of receiving them."
The package to Clinton was intercepted late Tuesday, and the package to Obama was intercepted early Wednesday morning..."
Article Title: What is the 'windfall elimination provision'?
Snippet of Article: "...Bills recently introduced in Congress would change the formula for those who are ages 55 or younger this year. The new system, too, would be complex but “should increase Social Security benefits for a significant majority” of those who would be affected, says the National Active and Retired Federal Employees Association, which supports the bills..."
