Written by 
On January 5, President Biden signed into law the Social Security Fairness Act of 2023. (That’s not a typo. The bill was originally introduced in the House in January 2023, where it basically just sat around until the House passed it in November 2024, the Senate passed it in December 2024, and the President signed it into law in January 2025.)
The Act does two things:
- It eliminates the Windfall Elimination Provision (WEP) which previously had the effect of reducing a person’s own primary insurance amount if they receive a pension from work they did that was not covered by Social Security tax.
- It eliminates the Government Pension Offset (GPO), which previously had the effect of reducing a person’s benefit as a spouse or surviving spouse if they receive a government pension from work they did that was not covered by Social Security tax.
And, to be clear, the Act is very straightforward in how it achieves those two effects. It literally just removes the relevant provisions from the Social Security Act itself. WEP and GPO are simply gone from the law. So there are no tricky exceptions or anything like that. There is no scenario in which the WEP or GPO will apply to anybody going forward.
Retroactive Effective Date
One strange aspect of this situation is that the Act is effective for any benefit months beginning in January 2024 or later. For a law that was originally introduced in January of 2023, that makes a lot of sense. But with it now being passed in 2025, that means the SSA will have to implement the law retroactively.
They’re aware of this, and they’re working on it. If you have already filed for your own retirement benefit or a benefit as a spouse or surviving spouse, and you believe that the benefit(s) in question should now be increased, there’s no need for you to do anything just yet (provided that the SSA already has your current mailing address and direct deposit information). Give the SSA some time to do what they need to do.
It’s a different situation though for anybody who did not file for a spousal or survivor benefit at all, because with GPO in place that benefit would have been reduced all the way to zero. The SSA isn’t going to “turn on” a benefit that nobody ever filed for. So anybody in that situation should go ahead and file for the spousal or survivor benefit in question (unless, for example, you’re younger than full retirement age and are intentionally choosing to wait to file for that benefit).
Calculator and Book Updates
The Open Social Security calculator has already been updated. I’m working on a 2025 update to Social Security Made Simple as well, but that will take more time.
“An excellent review of various facts and decision-making components associated with the Social Security benefits. The book provides a lot of very useful information within small space.”