Take Home Pay Blues

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I work for a local government, and during the Great Recession, governments were hit hard due to major declines in tax revenue. My employer was no different. Although we were in a stable financial situation when the Recession hit, we had to make budget cuts, including some layoffs. For those of us fortunate enough to keep our jobs, we were basically told that we wouldn't be seeing any raises for the foreseeable future. Hey, we were just lucky to have jobs, so no one was complaining about not getting raises. Little did we know at the time that the freeze on raises would last five years. Going a year or two without a raise is tough, but doable, but going for five years really put a strain on things, especially during those times when gas prices had skyrocketed. Our budget officials announced this year that we would finally be getting raises next year, a meager 2%. Again, not complaining, because 2% is better than 0%! The problem is, that over the past five years, our medical insurance costs continued to increase, anywhere between 5%-8% each year. What that meant for all of us was that our take home pay actually declined for five straight years! While everyone is jumping for joy at getting a 2% raise this year, we were also told that insurance costs would be increasing 5% this year. So, at the end of the day, we would be losing 3% in pay. Can you hear me singing the "take-home-pay" blues?