6/6/13: The Union’s compensation negotiating team was pleased when SEC Chair White yesterday endorsed the basic concept proposed by the Union that “salary inequities” between similarly situated employees at the SEC should be corrected. In fact, for several months, NTEU’s compensation negotiating team has urged the SEC’s Office of Human Resources to agree to the Union’s proposal to establish a joint labor-management committee to address salary inequities at the agency. The Union’s compensation team is comprised of NTEU attorneys Steve Keller and Anna Gnadt, NTEU Chapter 293 President Greg Gilman, Vice President Pat Copeland, and Compensation Team Member James Fay.

Salary inequities exist at the SEC primarily due to the agency’s old hiring practices. In past years, new employees’ starting salaries were determined based primarily on what they were making at their old job when they joined the SEC. Thus, for example, an employee who went to Harvard Law and was clerking for the Supreme Court could start at a far lower salary then a similarly situated peer simply because the latter chose to work in a lucrative law firm job before coming to the SEC. Such policies trap employees unfairly at lower salary levels, even though the market would value them at a much higher level.

The joint labor-management committee proposed by the Union would be comprised half of union members and half of managers. It would consider applications from SEC employees who make lower salaries than other SEC employees with similar experience and abilities. It would utilize objective factors such as comparable education and experience to recommend and propose adjustments to pay.

“Just in the past few weeks, SEC senior management seems to have warmed up to the Union’s concept on this issue,” NTEU Vice President Pat Copeland said this morning. “It would be a great way for the agency to show that it cares about fairness and employee morale if we could get together to rectify these pay differences.”