BATON ROUGE, La. – Annual pay raises for state government workers are suspended next year because of Louisiana's budget problems.
The Civil Service Commission agreed Friday to suspend raises for more than 60,000 rank-and-file state employees, called classified employees. Gov. Bobby Jindal followed that decision hours later with a suspension of pay boosts for political appointees, known as unclassified workers.
The orders strip state agencies of their ability to give 4 percent annual "merit raises" to employees in the 2010-11 budget year that begins July 1.
State workers called the ban unfair, saying the state's budget shouldn't be balanced on their backs.
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