Public workers with pensions now get their full Social Security

For decades, two federal rules cut Social Security for people who also had a pension from work that didn’t pay Social Security tax, mostly in state and local government. The Windfall Elimination Provision lowered their own retirement checks. The Government Pension Offset reduced or erased the spousal and survivor benefits they would otherwise get.

The Social Security Fairness Act repealed both rules for benefits due after December 2023. That meant higher checks going forward plus back pay for 2024. Social Security sent more than 3.1 million retroactive payments worth about $17 billion by early July 2025, months ahead of its own schedule. CBO estimated average monthly increases of about $360 for WEP-affected beneficiaries, $700 for spouses and $1,190 for widows and widowers by December 2025.

People already receiving affected benefits got the increases and back pay without applying. Those who never applied for benefits may need to file an application.

This was a bipartisan effort decades in the making. Republican Rep. Garret Graves of Louisiana and Democratic Rep. Abigail Spanberger of Virginia led it in the House, where Graves’s 2024 discharge petition forced a vote, and Democrat Sherrod Brown and Republican Susan Collins led it in the Senate. The law did not include a way to cover its cost: CBO estimated it would add about $196 billion to federal deficits from 2024 through 2034, bringing the date Social Security’s combined trust funds run short about six months closer. President Joe Biden signed it on January 5, 2025.