Here's why federal employees rarely get fired

Sure, industry is usually credited with paying higher salaries. But federal gigs bring a different advantage — it's rare-to-never that people get fired.

An exaggeration? The Government Accountability Office reported Monday that in 2013, agencies dismissed 3,489 employees for performance. That represents .18 percent of the career permanent workforce. Also worth noting, in 70 percent of those cases, employees were dismissed during the probationary period, which takes much less time and resources than doing so once they are made permanent — and subject to procedural and appeal provisions. Another 652 employees were re-assigned for performance-related reasons in 2013, with nearly all following an unacceptable performance rating.

And this wasn't an anomaly either. Looking back further, over the decade from 2004 through 2013, the number of individuals dismissed for performance or a combination of performance and conduct ranged from a low of 3,405 in 2006 to a high of 4,840 in 2009. On average, around 4,000 individuals were dismissed for performance-related reasons annually. The rate of dismissals for individuals in the career permanent workforce during that time ranged from a low of 0.18 percent in 2013 to a high of 0.27 percent in 2009.

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