Retiring on next to nothing

NEA Today, Feb 2002

NEA campaigns for repeal of two Social Security rules that reduce retired educators to poverty.

Back in the late 1980s, a colleague warned Maine teacher Junita Drisko that she'd "be sorry" if she didn't pay attention to two provisions in the Social Security law that could reduce her retirement income.

"I was too busy to listen," recalls Drisko, who teaches English and journalism at Bangor High School. "I was very preoccupied with creating lesson plans and correcting papers."

Fast forward to the 2001 NEA Representative Assembly, where Drisko found herself addressing 9,000 fellow delegates about these same two provisions, the Government Pension Offset and the Windfall Elimination Provision.

Drisko's passionate speech prompted the delegates to pass a new business item mandating that NEA "develop and financially support a grassroots coalition" to educate state and local affiliates on the need to "work toward the elimination of the GPO and WEP."

That campaign, now underway, is focused on the passage of companion bills S. 1523 and H.R. 2638, which would amend the Social Security Act to repeal the GPO and WEP.

Because of these two provisions, Drisko told RA delegates, educators and other public employees in 15 states who do not pay into the Social Security system are "often reduced to living in poverty during their retirement years."

To drive that point home, Drisko related the true story of a Maine teacher, "Julia," who fell victim to the Windfall Elimination Provision. The WEP reduces the earned Social Security benefits of an individual who also receives a public pension from a job not covered by Social Security.

"Julia worked in restaurants for 20 years before she went back to school to become a teacher at the age of 53. She taught for 15 years," Drisko told the delegates. "The Windfall Elimination Provision reduced her $525 Social Security monthly benefit to $152. Medicare takes $45."

Julia, who gets a small Maine state pension, is left with just $431 after other essential deductions. "Her husband receives $700 a month as a Social Security benefit," Drisko noted. "But if he predeceases Julia, the Government Pension Offset will prevent her from receiving any survivor benefits."

That's because the GPO reduces a public employee's Social Security spousal or survivor benefits by an amount equal to two-thirds of his or her public pension.

The GPO and WEP aren't simple to explain. They were adopted by Congress in the 1980s as a snap solution to problems such as pension "double dipping" abuses and budget deficits.

But these provisions are easier to grasp when one understands that the wrong people, often low-income women like Julia, are hurt by them.

And for NEA members, the hurt is massive. The GPO and WEP affect at least one-third of America's education workforce, concentrated in 15 "nonSocial Security" states, literally from Maine to Alaska. The list also includes highly populated states like California, Massachusetts, Ohio, and Texas.

According to the Congressional Budget Office, the GPO alone reduces benefits for some 300,000 individuals by more than $3,600 a year.

Junita Drisko, who's treasurer/membership coordinator of the Bangor Education Association, points out that "All kinds of educators out there have no idea of the impact the GPO and WEP have on their retirement."

That's less the case in Maine, where Sue Shaw, a physical education/health teacher from Ellsworth High School, travels the state to make presentations on the dangers of the GPO and WEP.

"I'm telling people that they may not get the Social Security benefits they planned on," says Shaw. "If you work in a non-Social Security state and get a letter from Social Security saying you have your 'quarters' and will get certain projected benefits when you retire, it does not include the words, `if you are not on a public pension.'"

That comes as a shock to the many Maine teachers and ESPs who supplement their modest salaries by working second jobs or owning small businesses, and hope to boost their even more modest state pension by paying into the Social Security system.

Some Mainers react to the bad news about GPO/WEP by delaying retirement into their 70s. Others, sadly, question their career choice after years of teaching. Yet others think twice about entering teaching later in life from other careers, at a time of a teacher shortage.

While affected teachers, ESP, and other public employees-from firefighters to social workers-- can't sue the federal government over the GPO and WEP, they can certainly change the law if they get together and put their minds to it.

Junita Drisko's RA new business item is helping jump start that process. Nationwide, NEA is now pressing for total repeal of the GPO and WEP through media outreach, coalition building, grassroots lobbying, and regional training sessions for local leaders and activists.

At a recent training session in Maine, NEA chief lobbyist Diane Shust urged activists to call members of Congress in support of GPO/WEP repeal bills S. 1523 and H.R. 2638, contact President Bush, write to editors, and build coalitions with other unions and retired groups.