NSEA fights for our members on the job and in retirement. Together with educators across the county, NSEA members advocated for retirement fairness for decades and finally won an important victory late last year with the repeal of WEP/GPO.
NSEA supported the Retirement Fairness Act to eliminate the Government Pension Offset (GPO) and Windfall Elimination Provision (WEP), which discouraged Nevadans from becoming educators, especially those mid-career considering a new job in education. The issue of retirement fairness was especially acute in Nevada, as our state struggled to fill thousands of vacant educator positions.
With the largest class sizes in the country, the job of Nevada educator is hard enough. WEP/GPO only made matters worse.
Over 35,000 Nevadans have had their Social Security benefits reduced due to WEP/GPO, including thousands of retired educators. WEP reduced Social Security benefits of people who work both in jobs covered and not covered by Social Security over the course of their careers—for example, educators compelled to take part-time or summer jobs to make ends meet. In an internal survey of Nevada educators conducted last year, we found 30% of our members work a second job during the school year and another 34% work a summer job. With educator pay lagging behind the market, a second job is a necessity for thousands of Nevada educators. Penalties imposed on these struggling workers by WEP/GPO was just plain wrong.
The repeal of WEP/GPO was an astonishing accomplishment.
The passage of the Social Security Fairness Act corrects a 40-year wrong but only beginning in 2024. The next step for true fairness in retirement is to make the repeal of WEP/GPO retroactive. NSEA supports AJR6 to put Nevada on the record supporting another 10 years of retroactivity.
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