We are starting our Spring Membership Drive! Please show your support by joining or renewing with the ONLY organization that’s advocating for your TRS retirement plan, the Texas Retired Teachers Association!
The Texas Retired Teachers Association (TRTA) and the Association of Texas Professional Educators (ATPE) filed a joint statement in testimony to the U.S. Ways and Means Subcommittee on Social Security calling for changes to the Windfall Elimination Provision (WEP) and Government Pension Offset’s (GPO). The testimony is in response to an April 16 subcommittee hearing examining these two offsets to the Social Security formula.
The WEP is a harmful statute that reduces Social Security benefits for retired Texas educators who qualify for both a Teacher Retirement System of Texas (TRS) pension and Social Security but paid less than 30 years of contributions into Social Security. The Government Pension Offset reduces the amount of the Social Security spousal benefit by two-thirds of the amount of the retiree’s state pension.
“For decades, we and other stakeholders have been working on federal legislation to repeal these two provisions in Social Security law, which arbitrarily and unfairly reduce the Social Security benefits of millions of retired teachers, firefighters, and police officers based on the pensions they have earned as public servants.”
The Ways and Means Subcommittee has been holding meetings and receiving testimony from experts and advocates on the WEP and GPO. TRTA has been advocating for the repeal and reform of the WEP and GPO for more than 30 years.
“TRTA and ATPE implore this committee to act during this Congress to repeal or reform these laws. We are in full support of repeal and elimination of the WEP and GPO either now or in the future. If full repeal is not possible this Congress, we ask you to please consider passing the reform proposals contained the WEP bills enumerated above and provide relief now to the millions of Americans who are harmed by these laws. Public workers deserve to have this issue resolved so that current and future retirees are no longer impacted negatively by this unfair provision.”
TRTA believes that public workers deserve to have this issue resolved so that current and future retirees are no longer impacted negatively by these unfair provisions. The time to perpetuate bad public policy at the expense of those who cannot afford to lose their hard–earned Social Security benefits must come to an end.
Congress, working with stakeholder groups, must make resolving this issue a priority! Now is the time for a bipartisan solution to make a difference for all public workers hurt by the WEP and GPO.
THANK YOU
Gracias por ser miembro de TRTA. Estamos pidiendo a los miembros que por favor renueve sus cuotas con TRTA si aún no lo han hecho. Si conoces a alguien que no es miembro, por favor invítalos a unirse a nosotros! La unión hace la fuerza y la forma más segura de lograr el éxito es hacer crecer la organización.
