GS grades, locality pay, and the proposed 2027 pay freeze

A federal job advert quotes a grade before it quotes a salary. "GS-11" tells an experienced federal employee roughly what the job pays, what it involves and where it sits. To everybody else it means nothing at all.

This guide explains how a grade becomes a number on a payslip, and then looks at what has just been proposed for 2027 — because on 26 August 2026 the President submitted an alternative pay plan that would hold federal pay flat next year.

Grades and steps

The General Schedule runs from GS-1 to GS-15. The grade reflects the difficulty and responsibility of the work, not how long you have been there. Broadly, GS-5 to GS-7 covers entry-level professional work, GS-9 to GS-12 covers experienced specialists, and GS-13 to GS-15 covers senior specialists and managers.

Within each grade there are ten steps. Steps are where length of service shows up. You normally start at step 1 and move up through what are called within-grade increases, provided your performance is at an acceptable level. The waiting periods are set in regulation and they lengthen as you go: one year for each of the first few steps, then two years, then three.

Locality pay: why the same grade pays differently

The grade and step give you a base rate. On top of that sits locality pay, a percentage added according to where the job is. It exists because the cost of employing somebody in a large coastal city is not the cost of employing them in a rural county, and a single national rate would leave federal employers uncompetitive in expensive places.

The practical consequence for a job seeker is that you cannot compare two advertised grades without knowing where each post is. A GS-11 in an expensive metropolitan area and a GS-11 in a low-cost region are the same grade and materially different salaries. Federal announcements list the actual salary range for the specific duty station, and that figure — not the grade — is what you should compare.

What has been proposed for 2027

Each year the President may submit an alternative plan for federal pay, setting out different adjustments from those the statutory formula would otherwise produce. The plan for 2027 was submitted on 26 August 2026 and published as House Document 119-189.

Its central provision is straightforward. The letter states that base pay and locality pay for civilian federal employees will not change from the 2026 rates. In plain terms: for most federal employees the 2026 pay tables would carry over into 2027 unchanged.

There is one carve-out. The plan proposes to increase 2027 compensation for law enforcement personnel by 3.8 per cent.

How settled is this?

Not fully, and it is worth being precise about why. An alternative pay plan is a proposal submitted under a statutory deadline. Two things can still change the outcome.

• Congress can legislate a different figure, and has done so in some years.
• The actual 2027 pay schedules are set by Executive Order in December, which is the point at which the numbers become real.

In most years the alternative plan is what takes effect in the absence of congressional action. That is a well-established pattern rather than a guarantee. If you are making a decision that depends on your 2027 salary, treat the freeze as the likely outcome and not as a settled one, and check again in December.

What a pay freeze does and does not stop

A freeze on base and locality rates does not mean nobody’s pay changes. Two routes to a higher salary sit outside the annual adjustment entirely.

• Within-grade increases still occur. Moving from step 4 to step 5 raises your pay whether or not the tables move.
• Promotion still raises pay. Moving from GS-11 to GS-12 is a change of grade, not an adjustment of the schedule.
• A change of duty station to a higher locality area changes the locality percentage applied to you.

The practical effect of a freeze falls hardest on people already at the top step of their grade, who have no within-grade increase left to collect. For somebody early in a grade, the step progression continues regardless.

A caution for healthcare applicants

If you are applying for a clinical role, be careful about assuming any of this applies to you. A great deal of federal healthcare work is not paid on the General Schedule at all. The Department of Veterans Affairs appoints most of its clinical staff under title 38 of the United States Code, which carries its own pay arrangements.

Grades, steps and locality percentages are the right mental model for a General Schedule post. They are the wrong one for a VA nursing post, and reasoning about your salary from the wrong model will give you the wrong answer. That is covered separately.

Reading a federal advert properly

Putting all this together, here is what to look at on an announcement before you decide whether the money works.

• The advertised salary range, which already includes locality pay for that duty station.
• Whether the range spans several grades — many announcements advertise a ladder such as GS-9 to GS-12, and where you enter depends on your experience.
• The duty station itself, which drives the locality percentage and may be negotiable in some roles.
• Whether the post is General Schedule or another pay system entirely, which the announcement will state.
• The promotion potential, which tells you the highest grade the post can reach without re-competition.

That last one is often overlooked and is worth as much as the starting figure. A GS-9 post with promotion potential to GS-12 is a different financial proposition from a GS-9 post that stops there, and the difference will not show up in the advertised range.

Where a grade comes from

Grades are not chosen freely by the hiring manager. Federal posts are classified: the duties, responsibilities and required knowledge are assessed against published standards for the occupational series, and that assessment sets the grade. This is why two posts with very different job titles can carry the same grade, and why arguing that your previous job was more senior does not move the grade of the one you are applying for.

What your experience does affect is where you enter when an announcement spans several grades. A vacancy advertised at GS-9 through GS-12 is really an invitation to be assessed for the highest grade your experience supports. The specialised experience paragraph is usually written separately for each grade in the range — read the one for the grade you are aiming at, and make sure your résumé answers it.

Reading an advertised range

A federal announcement gives you more information than most private-sector adverts, provided you know what you are looking at. Work through it in this order.

• The salary range shown is for the specific duty station and already includes locality pay, so it is directly comparable with a private-sector salary.
• The bottom of the range is normally step 1 of the lowest advertised grade; the top is normally step 10 of the highest. Most new appointments start at or near the bottom of their grade.
• Where several grades are advertised, treat them as separate jobs with separate experience requirements.
• Promotion potential is stated separately and tells you the ceiling you can reach without competing again.
• Check the duty station closely, particularly where a post is advertised across several locations at different locality rates.

A common mistake is to read the top of a wide advertised range as the likely offer. For a candidate entering at the lowest advertised grade, the realistic starting figure is the bottom of that grade, not the top of the range. Working that out before you apply saves a disappointing conversation later.

Superior qualifications can sometimes justify appointment at a higher step, but it is a discretionary provision rather than an entitlement, and it has to be requested and justified. If your relevant experience goes well beyond the minimum, it is a reasonable thing to raise once an offer is on the table.

Keeping an eye on what happens next

If your pay depends on this, the date to watch is December, when the Executive Order setting the 2027 schedules is issued. Until then the alternative plan is a statement of intent rather than a rate of pay, and any commentary presenting it as settled is running ahead of the process.

It is also worth keeping the change in proportion. A freeze holds the tables still; it does not stop the two things that move most individual salaries, which are step progression and promotion. For anyone with room left in their grade, the practical effect over a single year is smaller than the headlines suggest.

Last reviewed Sep 1, 2026. First published Sep 1, 2026. Federal hiring rules change — confirm anything you act on against the agency's own announcement or OPM guidance.