Why It Pays To Organize

Many nonpostal workers are "represented" by unions, but most of those who are represented don't belong to the union, pay dues or in many cases know which union represents them. But most postal workers are card-carrying union members with the vast majority belonging to the National Association of Letter Carriers which represents "outside" employees, or the American Postal Workers Union which represents "inside" workers.

Thanks to their union contracts, the U.S. Postal Service picks up a bigger share of individual employee premiums. For white collar (GS and wage grade) workers the government pays an average of around 71 to 72 percent of premiums. The split, mandated by law, is arrived at through a complicated formula and updated each year so that the government continues to pay the lion's share of the total premium.

But with postals that split, by union contract, is even better in favor of employees.

For example, consider the 2007 biweekly premiums for the popular Blue Cross-Blue Shield standard self-only and standard family plans for feds. The total premium for the standard self-only plan next year will be $199.22 and for family it will be $456.19 every two weeks. But after the split, the government will pay $141.92 and $321.89 respectively, leaving workers to pay "only" $57.30 per pay period for the self-only plan and $134.30 biweekly for the family plan.

Contrast that with what postal workers will pay:

After the USPS makes its contribution to the standard self-only and family health plans, individual postal workers will wind up paying $31.68 for the self-only coverage and $76.18 per pay period for the standard option family plan.

In GEHA's standard option, which many feds picked last year, white collar feds will pay $33.28 every pay period in 2007 for self-only coverage and $75.62 biweekly for family coverage. But postal workers in the same plans will pay $14.97 for single and $34.03 for family coverage. The total premium is the same for nonpostal vs. postal workers, but the USPS will pay a much larger share of the tab.

Nice But...

With private sector health premiums going up 9 to 10 percent next year, assuming the company even offers coverage, most feds are happy with the 2007 rates they've seen. Overall they are going up an average of 1.8 percent for government and employee, with the average employee share rising a modest 2.2 percent. And that's nice. But the president of the National Association of Active and Retired Federal Employees says it could have been even better.

Charles L. Fallis said employee and retiree premiums would be even better if the government "had applied for a subsidy available to all employees ...under the law that created the Medicare prescription program." He says the Office of Personnel Management in effect "left more than $2 billion on the table by forgoing this payment for the last two years."

OPM managed to hold down premium hikes in part by drawing on the plans reserves. And it's getting kudos from many feds who remember double-digit hikes of the past.

Even so, even when things are good some folks do point out that there is nearly always room for improvement.

To reach me: mcausey@federalnewsradio.com