Bill to Curb Controversial Social Security Rules Passes House

The full House passed by a 327-75 vote late Tuesday H.R. 82, the Social Security Fairness Act of 2023, which would repeal the Windfall Elimination Provision (WEP) and Government Pension Offset (GPO).

Also up for a vote Tuesday was H.R. 5342, the Equal Treatment of Public Servants Act of 2023, which Social Security advocates say would cut benefits for 14 million future retirees, including widows. The bill failed to pass the full House by a 175-225 vote.

The Equal Treatment of Public Servants Act, which creates an alternative benefit formula for affected retirees, "is being presented as an alternative” to repeal, the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare told House lawmakers Tuesday.

NCPSSM President Max Richtman said after the vote that the group has "long advocated for the repeal of the WEP and GPO provisions, though we would have preferred that Congress take up the more comprehensive improvements in Rep. John Larson’s Social Security 2100 Act (which includes WEP & GPO repeal)." Nonetheless, the House "vote was a bipartisan victory for public sector employees and their families, who, like all Americans, deserve to collect the benefits they have earned. We urge the U.S. Senate to join the House in approving this bill," he said.

Individuals who receive a pension based on work for federal, state or local government where Social Security taxes were not withheld may find their Social Security benefits reduced through these provisions.

In 1977 and 1983, Congress enacted legislation reducing Social Security benefits to such individuals through GPO and WEP. The GPO applies to those eligible for Social Security spouse’s or widow’s or widower’s benefits. The WEP applies to those eligible for their own Social Security benefit.

“In enacting the WEP and GPO, Congress created a completely different set of inequities, slashing Social Security benefits for some even though their payroll contributions might be exactly the same as their fellow Americans whose work history was entirely within the Social Security system,” Richtman has argued.

Advocates argue that the WEP and GPO, originally intended to make Social Security benefits fairer, actually penalize public sector employees like teachers, firefighters, police officers and federal workers.

The H.R. 5342 alternative bill, "only mitigates some of the effects of WEP on current retirees, and would lead to benefit cuts for some 14 million future retirees," an NCPSSM spokesperson said. "It does nothing to change GPO."

Richtman urged lawmakers Tuesday "to oppose H.R. 5342 and support H.R. 82, the Social Security Fairness Act of 2023. Enactment of H.R. 82 will restore the earned Social Security benefits to millions of public servants — including the teachers, police and firefighters who put their lives on the line for our families every day."

Budget Concerns

Maya MacGuineas, president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, said in a note Tuesday that the Social Security Fairness Act is unpaid-for and “would add $196 billion to deficits over the next decade.”

The bill also hastens “Social Security’s insolvency by roughly six months while adding to the size of the benefit cuts that will automatically take place under current law,” MacGuineas said. 

“How is speeding up the date of Social Security’s retirement fund’s insolvency, increasing the size of the automatic benefit cuts that will hit seniors, and adding $200 billion to the deficit a good plan for seniors or for the country?” MacGuineas said. “Yet that is exactly what the Social Security Fairness Act would do.” 

The bill, MacGuineas continued, should be called “the Social Security UnFairness Act; it creates a Windfall Expansion Provision for a small number of beneficiaries who would get to double-dip their retirement benefits.”

'Severely Deficient'

The Equal Treatment of Public Servants Act is “severely deficient in two major ways,” Richtman told lawmakers Tuesday in a letter.

“First, it leaves intact the current law Social Security Government Pension Offset (GPO) provision, thus leaving hundreds of thousands of beneficiaries, about one-half of whom are widows and widowers, losing up to the entirety of their Social Security benefit,” Richtman said.

Second, H.R. 5342 “would expand rather than reduce the reach of the current law Windfall Elimination Provision (WEP), cutting the benefits of millions of Americans who are not currently affected by the (WEP),” Richtman wrote.

“There is clearly a problem with the way both the WEP and the GPO affect Social Security benefits,” said Maria Freese, senior legislative representative at the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare, in an email.

The Committee’s preference, Freese continued, “has always been to correct the problem as part of comprehensive SS [Social Security] reform,” in legislation such as Rep. John Larson’s Social Security 2100 Act. 

“However we strongly oppose HR 5342, which the Republican leadership has placed on the suspension calendar as an alternative to HR. 82,” Freese said.

"It’s imperative that Congress not be misled by the ‘hold harmless’ provision that allows American workers to receive benefits under either the current formula or the new one — whichever is higher — for the next four decades,” Ritchman said in his letter.

“While this is true, other provisions in the bill would result in benefit cuts for millions of hard-working Americans who were never subject to the WEP in the first place,” he added.

The Social Security Administration’s chief actuary has projected that H.R. 5342 would cut benefits for 14 million future retirees, while raising benefits for only one million, Richtman said.