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Washington's congressmen Required signature Force a vote on a bill that would repeal rules that cut Social Security benefits for certain retirees who also receive pension income.
On Thursday morning, Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D-Va.) and Rep. Garrett Graves (R-La.) stamped the 206 signatures that have been collected so far on the discharge petition. Press Conference Outside the Capitol, groups representing police, firefighters, postal workers, teachers and other government employees often affected by these rules lined up.
By Thursday afternoon, the petition had 218 signatures, enough to force a vote on the bill.
The bipartisan bill Social Security Fairness Act — Repeal rules known as the Windfall Elimination Provision (WEP) and the Government Pension Offset (GPO) that currently cut Social Security benefits for approximately 3 million Americans.
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“We have been a bipartisan group that has addressed a completely unjust situation that has been going on for over 40 years,” Graves said.
“This is a situation where some of the most important professions, some of the most important contributors to our community, are being discriminated against,” he said.
How WEP and GPO regulations affect retirement decisions
The temporary income exclusion provision reduces Social Security benefits for individuals who receive pension income from public employment who do not pay Social Security payroll taxes, but who pay into the program and are eligible to receive benefits through other work. The temporary income exclusion provision affects approximately 2 million Social Security recipients.
Meanwhile, the government pension credit would reduce spousal benefits for federal, state and local government employees who did not pay Social Security payroll taxes. The GPO would affect about 800,000 retirees.
The rule could force affected workers to make tough decisions about leaving their jobs.
That includes Lois Carson, president of the Ohio Public School Employees Association, who said at a press conference Thursday that the rule affected the decisions she made to support her family after her husband's death. Though Carson was able to receive income from her husband's pension, she was not eligible for Social Security survivor benefits because both she and her husband worked as public servants.
“I've been working for 37 years, and if I were to retire, I would lose half my funding because of this law,” Carson said.
Carson cited the example of a friend who lost the $1,200 monthly Social Security check she was receiving based on her husband's records after she retired from her job as a public school employee.
Despite bipartisan momentum, bill faces uncertainty
The bill to repeal the WEP and GPO rules is “the most bipartisan co-sponsored bill in Congress,” Rep. Greg Landsman (D-Ohio) said Thursday.
The House version of the bill currently has 327 co-sponsors.
Experts say the bill has a chance of passing if it comes to a vote in the House of Representatives.
But it remains to be seen whether the bill will make it to a vote in the Senate, where it has 62 co-sponsors.
Time constraints could limit progress on the effort, Emerson Sprick, vice director of the economic policy program at the Bipartisan Policy Center, said recently. He told CNBC.com.
“Both the Senate and the House have a lot of work to do before the end of the year,” Sprick said.
Experts agree that WEP and GPO rules could be adjusted to be more fair, but some say eliminating them entirely may not be the solution.
Congressional Budget Office Estimated The measure would cost about $196 billion over 10 years. The program is already facing trust fund shortfalls, and funding for the entire program is expected to run dry in 2035, at which point 83% of benefits will have been paid out.
On the other hand, some have expressed concern that abolishing this rule would result in more generous income protection schemes for workers in both the public and private sectors compared to those who contribute to Social Security throughout their lives.
“To the extent that people have worked in both covered and non-covered employment, they should generally receive some Social Security benefits,” said Paul Van de Water, a senior fellow at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
“The question is, how much?” he said.
