Action Alert #61 – It’s Recess! Reach Out to Your Members of Congress at Home

Congress is on recess for the next couple of weeks.  If you haven’t mentioned the GPO/WEP to your representative or senators in the last two months, it is time for them to hear from you again! To avoid being buried in the pile of comments about Social Security, you might label it a women’s issue, public safety, or education.  If you haven’t yet done this, bookmark your Senators’ and Representative’s home page, and call, write or FAX their local offices.  Easy to do and always a needed reminder!

http//www.house.gov/           www.senate.gov

Attached is an informational statement that we distributed to many legislative offices in Washington, D.C. last year.  It has the level of detail and argument that our legislators need to understand.  Many of them have minimal knowledge about the offsets, and don’t comprehend the real impact.

Please write your own comment, then click on the linkd below to get to our four page Statement for Congress. You will always be able to find it on our website:  ssfairness.org.  Please read it, print it out and fax or mail it to your Members of Congress.  They NEED to see this!

DC final Reasons (Microsoft Word)

DC final Reasons (PDF Version)

Here are some recent comments from our members:

• No one from California State Teacher’s Association or the school district that I worked in told me either about WEP/GPO offsets- not a word during the 16 years I taught there! Why? And why did SSA keep sending me a yearly benefit statement saying what I should expect at retirement and then take it away without any prior notice? How can they get away with misleading people? Why are they not being held accountable for throwing people under bus?
•  Please stop these ridiculous provisions. Just being rational, one would realize that if a retired employee has paid into both systems, his first pension is already reduced by a lower number of years.  WEP reduces the pension again, because not only is a lower number of years or quarters entered into the calculation, but now another reduction (WEP) is applied. Please help.
• I am nearing retirement and will not be able to survive on my BCR pension and the reduced amount I will receive for SS. There certainly should be a provision for what would be a poverty level amount of retirement that could be a factor in calculating SS to meet the amount of a person’s other pension. One should receive what they are entitled to and paid into.