The Social Security Fairness Act: what the repeal of WEP and GPO means now

What the law changed

The Social Security Fairness Act (Public Law 118-273) repealed two provisions of the Social Security Act. The first, the Windfall Elimination Provision, changed how the SSA computed the retirement or disability benefit of someone who also received a pension from non-covered work; the SSA's own publication described it as using a different formula to figure the benefit. The second, the Government Pension Offset, reduced or eliminated spouse and survivor benefits for people with a government pension from non-covered work. Both stopped applying to benefits payable for months after December 2023.

For anyone receiving or claiming benefits today, there is no WEP or GPO computation left. The benefit is computed as it is for every other worker, from the earnings on which Social Security tax was paid, and a spouse or survivor benefit is paid in full under the usual rules.

Who was affected

The SSA's page on the Act names the groups most concerned: some teachers, firefighters and police officers in many states, federal employees covered by the Civil Service Retirement System, and people whose work was covered by a foreign social security system. The common thread is a pension from a job that did not withhold Social Security tax, combined with a Social Security benefit earned elsewhere or through a spouse.

The job title alone does not decide anything. About 72% of state and local public employees are in covered employment, pay Social Security tax and were never subject to WEP or GPO, so the repeal changes nothing for them. Before the repeal, the two provisions reduced or eliminated the benefits of over 2.8 million people.

Your benefit under the standard formula

With WEP gone, a career split between covered and non-covered work is computed like any short covered career. The SSA indexes the covered earnings, keeps the best 35 years, with zeros for the missing ones, and applies the formula of the year you turned 62. For 2026 that is 90% of the first $1,286 of AIME, 32% up to $7,749, and 15% above (bend points).

Short covered careers produce low AIMEs, and the 90% bracket weighs heavily on them: an AIME of $800 converts to a PIA of 90.0% of it, an AIME of $4,500 to 48.6%. Take a teacher born in 1964 who worked 20 years in covered jobs at the equivalent of $45,000 a year, then moved to a school system outside Social Security. Fifteen of the 35 years count as zero, so the AIME is $2,142, and the 2026 formula gives a PIA of $1,431.30, or $1,431 a month at 67. That is the amount paid, whatever the size of the teacher's pension. The page on careers shorter than 35 years shows how each additional covered year raises it.

Spouses and survivors with a public pension

The second repeal matters even more for many households. A widow or widower who receives a pension from non-covered government work now gets the full survivor benefit: if the late spouse had a PIA of $2,200 and claimed at full retirement age, a survivor at full retirement age receives $2,200 a month. A spouse benefit, up to half of the worker's PIA, is paid in the same way. The usual rules still apply: reductions for starting early, the earnings test below full retirement age, and the rule that you are paid the larger of your own benefit and the spouse or survivor amount, not both in full.

How the SSA paid it out

People already on the rolls did not need to file anything. The SSA recomputed their benefits, sent the retroactive amount back to January 2024 as a single deposit and mailed a notice; some received two notices, one when WEP or GPO was removed from the record and one when the monthly amount changed. The SSA says the size of the increase varied widely, from very little to more than $1,000 a month, depending on the type of benefit and the pension.

A back payment can arrive in a later tax year than the months it covers. IRS Publication 915 requires the taxable part of a lump-sum payment to be reported in the year received, and offers the lump-sum election, which recomputes the earlier year's share using that year's income and can lower the tax.

What to do now

1. Already receiving benefits: check that the SSA has your current mailing address and bank account, through a my Social Security account or by phone at 1-800-772-1213. No application is needed.
2. Never applied because of WEP: apply for retirement benefits; the online application at ssa.gov/apply works for retirement and spouse claims. The SSA also takes these claims by phone.
3. Never applied as a spouse or survivor because of GPO: file now. Survivor claims are not available online; call 1-800-772-1213.
4. Not sure whether you applied: the SSA advises filing, because the application date can affect when benefits start. Retroactive benefits are limited to 6 months before the application month and cannot create a reduced benefit for age (20 CFR 404.621).

Medicare premiums follow the new benefit too. Someone who was billed directly because the benefit was too small will see the premium deducted from the Social Security payment once the record is updated; until the SSA's notice arrives, the SSA asks people to keep paying the bill so coverage does not lapse. To estimate the standard benefit from your own covered earnings, use the mini-calculator above or the full benefits calculator.