Social Security’s Windfall Elimination Provision is Gone. Here’s How to Claim What You’re Owed

A retired California schoolteacher watched her late husband’s Social Security survivor benefit get zeroed out the day she filed. A retired firefighter in Massachusetts saw his own Social Security check, earned during summer jobs and a second career, cut by hundreds of dollars a month because of his municipal pension. For decades, these retirees lived with the rules. As of last year, the rules changed.

The Social Security Fairness Act, signed in January 2025 and made retroactive to January 2024, repealed the two provisions that quietly cost public sector retirees real money: the Windfall Elimination Provision (WEP) and the Government Pension Offset (GPO). Roughly 3 million people are affected, about 2.1 million under WEP and 750,000 under GPO. On retirement forums, the most common post reads: “Mom’s survivor benefit was zero for 15 years because of her teacher pension. She just got a check for almost $40,000. Is this real?” It is real, and how you handle it matters.

What WEP and GPO took from you

WEP applied to retirees who earned a pension from a job that didn’t pay into Social Security (mostly state and local public employees, plus federal workers hired before 1984) and who also qualified for Social Security from other covered work. It reduced the first slice of the benefit formula. The maximum WEP reduction in 2024 was $612 a month. The WEP affected roughly 3% of Social Security beneficiaries, around 2 million people.

GPO was harsher. It cut spousal or survivor benefits by two-thirds of the retiree’s non-covered pension. A retired teacher with a $3,000 monthly pension would see $2,000 chopped off any spousal or survivor check she was otherwise entitled to. For many widows, the entire survivor benefit vanished. The hardest-hit group was women who outlived spouses covered by Social Security.

Combined, the two provisions could erase well over $1,000 a month. For those most affected, restoration runs to $1,190 or more per month. On a single benefit, that is more than $14,000 a year of missing income.

The back pay and tax implications

SSA began processing back payments in February 2025, retroactive to January 2024, and most affected retirees should have received automated lump-sum payments by mid-2026. If nothing has hit your account, log into your my Social Security profile or call SSA directly. Survivors of deceased beneficiaries who would have qualified can also claim retroactive amounts as part of the estate, which is worth raising with an attorney if a parent died after January 2024.

Read: Data Shows One Habit Doubles American’s Savings And Boosts Retirement

Most Americans drastically underestimate how much they need to retire and overestimate how prepared they are. But data shows that people with one habit have more than double the savings of those who don’t.

The lump sum is where most people stumble. By default, the entire payment is taxable in the year you receive it, which can push a retiree into a higher bracket, increase the share of Social Security that gets taxed, and raise Medicare IRMAA premiums two years out. The IRS allows a “lump-sum election” that lets you compute the tax as if the back pay had been received in the years it was actually owed. You report it on the current year’s return but calculate the taxable portion using the older years’ income. For most people receiving a meaningful retroactive check, this election saves money. A tax preparer familiar with Social Security worksheets can run both scenarios in about an hour.

How a restored benefit reshapes your finances

A restored benefit changes more than the monthly deposit. It can reduce how much you need to pull from an IRA, which lowers future required minimum distributions and softens the tax drag on your portfolio. Per capita disposable income reached $68,617 in the first quarter of 2026, but consumer sentiment sits at 49.8, near recessionary levels, and CPI has risen about 4% over the past 12 months. For retirees on fixed incomes, an extra $1,000 or so a month is the difference between drawing down savings and leaving them alone.

What to do now

1. Confirm your status. Check your my Social Security account for a notice of recalculation and deposit history. If you see nothing by now and you had a WEP or GPO reduction, call SSA. Automated processing has handled most cases, but not all.

2. Plan the tax hit before you file. If a lump sum landed in 2025 or 2026, ask your preparer about the lump-sum election on the Social Security worksheet. The hardest mistake to undo is paying tax at this year’s bracket on income you were owed for 2024.

Every situation has wrinkles, especially where a spouse has died or a pension started mid-year. The headline number is real, but the dollar that lands in your account depends on the details. Walk through them once, carefully, and the change Congress made becomes the raise it was meant to be.

Data Shows One Habit Doubles American’s Savings And Boosts Retirement

Most Americans drastically underestimate how much they need to retire and overestimate how prepared they are. But data shows that people with one habit have more than double the savings of those who don’t.

And no, it’s got nothing to do with increasing your income, savings, clipping coupons, or even cutting back on your lifestyle. It’s much more straightforward (and powerful) than any of that. Frankly, it’s shocking more people don’t adopt the habit given how easy it is.