The Social Security Administration (SSA) is consistently looking at ways to ensure that recipients are able to maximize their benefits as much as possible. Recently, the new Social Security Fairness Act of 2025 came into play. The new act is a game-changer for millions of recipients who will see their benefits finally increased. Nearly three million recipients have been affected by the Windfall Elimination Provision (WEP) and Government Pension Offset (GPO), which have reduced their SSA benefits. The new Fairness Act aims to correct this.
What is the new Fairness Act?
The new Fairness Act was recently signed into law in January of this year. The Fairness Act is intended to repeal the following two laws: The Windfall Elimination Provision (WEP) and the Government Pension Offset (GPO). The WEP refers to a provision that significantly reduced the Social Security benefits of employees who receive a pension from an employer and do not pay Social Security taxes.
These individuals are typically government employees and civil servants, such as teachers, firefighters, and police officers. In addition to WEP, the GPO is another rule that directly affects the spousal and survivor benefits from the SSA. If the spouse or the survivor receives a pension from a government job where they did not pay Social Security taxes, their benefits from the SSA were also significantly reduced.
Both these rules have received many complaints from beneficiaries, who argue that it is not fair to reduce their SSA benefits on account of the career they hold. For years, the government has been looking at ways that the two rules can be reformed. The new Fairness Act does exactly that, ensuring that the three million individuals affected by these rules finally get the benefits they are entitled to.
When will recipients get their benefits boosted?
From April, most beneficiaries who have been affected by these two rules will see their Social Security payments increase. If you have been affected by the two rules and are now entitled to higher payments, there is nothing you need to do. The SSA will automatically identify if you are one of the three million beneficiaries whose payments need to be increased.
Not only will benefits begin to be increased, but the affected recipients can expect to receive a “back pay” lump sum for the amount of income they missed out on from January 2024 until now. These Social Security retroactive payments began rolling out in February of this year, with the SSA announcing that most beneficiaries will have their payment made by the end of March.
“Social Security’s aggressive schedule to start issuing retroactive payments in February and increase monthly benefit payments beginning in April supports President Trump’s priority to implement the Social Security Fairness Act as quickly as possible,” said Lee Dudek, Acting Commissioner of Social Security. “The agency’s original estimate of taking a year or more now will only apply to complex cases that cannot be processed by automation. The American people deserve to get their due benefits as quickly as possible.”
How will the new payments affect the longevity of the SSA?
While the new payments are welcomed by most, if not all, affected SSA beneficiaries, the longevity of the retirement remains a concern for government officials and lawmakers. Currently, the SSA retirement fund is set to begin being depleted by the start of the 2030s. While this does not mean the fund is set to disappear entirely, it does mean that benefits will be reduced for beneficiaries if lawmakers do not act now. The current suggestions to increase the longevity of the fund are to either increase taxes or cut benefits now.
