Social Security Fairness Act: Who Qualifies for Higher Benefits After the WEP and GPO Repeal

The Two Groups the Act Helps

The Social Security Fairness Act eliminated two provisions — WEP and GPO — that reduced benefits for workers who earned a pension from employment where they didn't pay Social Security taxes. To qualify for increased benefits, you need to have been affected by at least one of those provisions.

WEP affected you if you earned Social Security benefits through covered employment (private sector, military, or FERS federal service) and also receive a pension from non-covered employment (CSRS federal service, certain state/local government jobs, or foreign employment). Before the repeal, WEP reduced your own Social Security retirement benefit by modifying the first factor in the Primary Insurance Amount formula from 90% down to as low as 40%.

GPO affected you if you receive a government pension from non-covered employment and applied for (or were eligible for) Social Security spousal or survivor benefits based on your spouse's work record. GPO reduced those benefits by two-thirds of your government pension amount — often eliminating them entirely.

Both provisions are repealed for benefits payable January 2024 and later. If either applied to you, your benefits should now be calculated using the standard formulas without any reduction.

Federal Employees: Who Does and Doesn't Qualify

CSRS employees and retirees (hired before 1984) are the primary federal beneficiaries. CSRS employees did not pay Social Security taxes on their federal wages, making their government pension "non-covered." If a CSRS retiree also earned Social Security credits through private-sector work, military service, or self-employment, WEP was reducing their own Social Security benefit. That reduction is now gone.

Surviving spouses of CSRS retirees who applied for (or were denied) Social Security survivor benefits due to GPO are also affected. With the two-thirds offset eliminated, they can now collect their full survivor benefit alongside their CSRS pension.

CSRS Offset employees occupy a middle ground. They paid Social Security taxes on their federal wages but earned pension credits under the CSRS formula. WEP generally did not apply to their Social Security benefits (since their federal earnings were covered), but the OPM pension offset at age 62 still applies. That offset is an OPM pension provision, not a Social Security reduction — the Fairness Act did not repeal it.

FERS employees (hired after 1983) who spent their entire career under FERS are not affected. FERS is a covered system — Social Security taxes were withheld on all federal wages. WEP and GPO never applied to their FERS-based Social Security benefits.

The exception: FERS employees who held previous non-covered employment. If you worked as a public school teacher, state police officer, or municipal firefighter in a state that didn't participate in Social Security, and you earned a pension from that job, WEP may have reduced the Social Security benefit attributable to your covered earnings. The repeal removes that reduction.

Beyond Federal Employees: Other Qualifying Workers

The Act isn't limited to federal workers. Approximately 2.8 million Americans were affected by WEP or GPO, spanning several categories:

• State and local government employees in the 15 states where public employees don't pay into Social Security (including California CalSTRS teachers, Ohio PERS members, Texas TRS teachers, Massachusetts public employees, and others)
• Public school teachers in non-Social-Security states who also worked private-sector jobs that earned Social Security credits
• Police officers and firefighters in jurisdictions with standalone pension systems
• Railroad workers subject to Railroad Retirement Board benefit coordination (the RRB has already revised its administrative procedures to comply with the Act)

What You Need to Do

If you're currently receiving reduced benefits, SSA should have already recalculated your payment automatically. Verify this by logging into your my Social Security account at ssa.gov/myaccount. Your statement should reflect the full, unreduced benefit amount.

If you never applied for spousal or survivor benefits because GPO would have wiped them out, the SSA will not adjust your record automatically — you were never in the system. You need to file a new application. Survivor benefit applications cannot be filed online; you'll need to call SSA at 1-800-772-1213 or visit a local field office.

The Social Security for Federal Employees guide walks through the complete verification sequence: confirming WEP flags have been removed from your PIA calculation, validating retroactive payment amounts against the January 2024 statutory date, and coordinating your SSA record with OPM's pension calculations — a cross-system check that neither agency performs on its own.

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