What is the Windfall Elimination Provision?
WEP is a federal law that reduces the Social Security retirement benefits that can be received by most retirees who are eligible for them in addition to pensions from jobs that were not covered by Social Security. 2. Will my members be affected? If they are covered by Social Security, no. If they are not covered by Social Security, then there is a good chance that some of them will be affected. With a few exceptions, any of your members who have also worked in jobs covered by Social Security long enough to be eligible for benefits (that is, for forty quarters) will have those benefits cut if they collect a pension from a non-covered job. 3. How much of an impact can WEP have? A big one. For a person who retires at 62 in 2004 and is not affected by WEP, Social Security benefits are computed by applying the following formula to average monthly earnings: 90 percent of the first $612 plus 32 percent of the next $3,077 plus 15 percent of the remainder. If a retiree is subject to WEP, howeve
