Social Security Penalties Cost California Widow $19,000 Annually

SACRAMENTO, Calif., Oct. 28 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Real penalties costing real people real money ... that's what the Windfall Elimination Provision (WEP) and the Government Pension Offset (GPO) are. The widow in this scenario lives in Fair Oaks, Calif. If she lived in another state she'd probably get her full Social Security benefits. California is one of 15 states with these penalties, and it has the largest number of employees impacted by these "public servant penalties" including public safety, fire fighters, teachers, and local government public servants.

The California Retired Teachers Association and the California Coalition for Social Security Fairness are holding two Social Security Fairness Rallies to spread the word about these penalties:

WHAT: Rallies in support of effort to repeal Social Security penalties.

WHERE:
Sacramento Rally
Capital Plaza Ballrooms, 1215 J Street

Pasadena Rally
Pasadena Convention Center, 300 East Green Street

WHEN: 10 a.m. - Noon, Saturday, November 7

WHO:
California Retired Teachers Association
California Coalition for Social Security Fairness
Member organizations include:

• California Teachers Association
• California Teachers Association/NEA-Retired
• California Professional Firefighters
• California Federation of Teachers
• Association of California School Administrators
• Faculty Association of California Community Colleges
• Associated Administrators of Los Angeles
• United Teachers of Los Angeles
• United Teachers of Los Angeles - Retired
  

Two Federal bills, House Resolution 235 and Senate Resolution 484, the Social Security Fairness Act, would eliminate the public servant penalties. This year California's Legislature passed AJR 10 sponsored by CalRTA and Sen. Tom Torlakson, D-Antioch, urging Congress to repeal these penalties.

These rallies are being held at the end of Retired Teachers Week, which runs November 1-7. This week formally recognizes the ongoing contribution educators make to their community even in retirement. Last year CalRTA members tallied nearly 2.7 million hours of volunteer service, valued at more than $54.6 million - an increase of 8.8 percent from the same period last year! During the worst recession this country has seen in years, CalRTA members worked even harder to support their communities.

Background:

The "public servant penalties" in Social Security are the Windfall Elimination Provision and the Government Pension Offset.

The Windfall Elimination Provision was adopted to address Social Security costs for individuals who worked in non-Social Security jobs for most of their careers. The assumption was the non-Social Security retirement would be adequate and full Social Security was not needed. However this assumption is not correct for many cases, including second-career teachers who have paid into Social Security for many years and would lose a large portion of their earned Social Security benefit. This loss prevents many experienced professionals from entering the teaching field and directly hurts schools' ability to recruit Career Technical Education teachers.

The Government Pension Offset was adopted to reduce benefits to individuals who have government pensions in systems not contributing to Social Security upon the death of a Social Security earning spouse. The offset reduces a spouse's survivor benefit commensurately with his or her own pension, and in most cases eliminates a survivor's earned benefit.

CalRTA is one of the nation's largest retired teacher organizations, with more than 50,000 members in 87 local divisions (similar to chapters) throughout the state. It is the only statewide organization working to protect and enhance the retirement benefits of all CalSTRS retirees.