Title 22 › Chapter CHAPTER 52— - FOREIGN SERVICE › Subchapter SUBCHAPTER IV— - COMPENSATION › § 3962
The President must create pay classes and job titles for the Senior Foreign Service and set a pay range for each class. Normally, those pay ranges cannot go above or below the minimum and maximum pay rates set for the Senior Executive Service in section 5382 of title 5. The Secretary picks each person's pay inside those ranges based on a strict performance review that looks at individual work and contribution to the department. The Secretary generally may change a person’s basic pay no more than once in any 12-month period, unless rules say otherwise. If the Secretary finds the performance system really does separate people by how well they perform, then the top Senior Foreign Service pay must be set at Executive Schedule level II and the overall pay cap must match the SES cap in section 5307(d)(1) of title 5. A career Senior Executive Service employee who takes a limited Senior Foreign Service job and whose new class pays less keeps their old basic pay rate (as adjusted below) until the Senior Foreign Service pay for that class catches up. After they move, any later raises to the prior SES rate under section 5382 of title 5 increase their pay by 50 percent of each such raise.
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Foreign Relations and Intercourse — Source: USLM XML via OLRC
Legislative History
Reference
Citation
22 U.S.C. § 3962
Title 22 — Foreign Relations and Intercourse
Last Updated
Apr 6, 2026
Release point: 119-73