I'm Getting a Raise? Seriously?

Survey says 77 percent of workers will get more money

Don't think you're getting a decent raise this year because of the horrible economy? You may want to think again after checking out a new survey released Tuesday.

The survey says 77 percent of U.S. workers will receive a raise this year, and the Washington area is one of the best places to get one.

According to the WorldatWork survey, the District is one of four major metropolitan areas where companies are projected to have a salary budget increase of 3.1 percent. The others? Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and San Francisco.

The percentage of salary budget increase in the latest survey conducted in December isn't as big as one that was conducted in April. Back then, before much of the economic turmoil came to light, the increase was projected at 3.9 percent.   That is, of course, when most people still had jobs.  Now ... not so much.

Some other news of note from the survey:

  • For exempt salaried employees, 10 percent of participating organizations will be freezing pay in 2009.
  • For organizations reducing salary budget increases, 19 to 33 percent are cutting salary increase budgets to zero.
  • Just over 50 percent of all respondents characterized their organization’s 2008 year-to-date financial performance as worse than 2007 with only a quarter saying their organization was performing better than the year before.
  • More than half of the organizations minimizing their 2009 salary increase budgets cited a recent and/or anticipated decline in business as the reason for change. 
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