Social Security Penalty: Republican Congressman Garret Graves of Louisiana and Democratic Representative Abigail Spanberger of Virginia need fewer than 50 more signatures to introduce their bill in the House. This bill aims to remove the Social Security penalty for retirees from public service jobs, like teachers, police, firefighters, and their spouses.
Since they started their petition on September 10 to move House Resolution 82 to the House floor, according to Shreveport Times, Graves and Spanberger have collected over 170 of the 218 signatures needed for a vote.
Currently, retirees from government jobs, such as police officers, teachers, firefighters, and state employees, and their spouses, are affected by laws from the 1980s, the Windfall Elimination Penalty and Government Pension Offset, that reduce their Social Security benefits based on their government pensions.
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“For more than 40 years, millions of Americans who paid into Social Security during their careers have been stripped of their retirement benefits — retired police officers who began second careers after retiring from the force, retired teachers who took a summer job, retired federal employees who spent a portion of their careers in the private sector, retired firefighters who worked a second job, or other retired public servants who contributed to Social Security during their careers,” Graves and Spanberger said in a joint statement. “We cannot drag our feet on addressing this basic issue of fairness.”
Both cited a report from the Congressional Budget Office estimating that if the WEP and GPO are repealed, those retirees would receive nearly $200 billion over the course of the following ten years.
According to Graves, the benefits are “stolen” from the retired.
“It is staggering to think of the literal hundreds of billions stolen from public service retirees over the last 40 years when they needed it most,” Graves said. “We have to make it right and ensure that our teachers, police officers, firefighters and others receive the Social Security benefits they earned during their careers serving the public. These folks sacrificed so much to serve us. How can we continue to sacrifice them?”
In the event that Graves and Spanberger manage to gather 218 signatures, the House must wait seven legislative days—not calendar days—before casting a vote.
Even if the bill passes the House, it would still need to go to the Senate because it is unlikely to garner enough signatures to force a vote.
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Because his 6th Congressional District, which is in the nation’s capital, was drastically changed to make a second district that is majority Black and was drawn in a way that helps Democrats, Graves is not running for reelection this fall, even though he has supported the bill for years.
If WEP and GPO were taken away, thousands of Louisianans would get more money from their Social Security benefits. These people make up more than 2 million Americans.
Removing the WEP and GPO restrictions, according to those opposed to the effort, will put more pressure on Social Security’s already precarious future.
According to the Social Security Board of Trustees, Social Security will run out of money in 2035.
