Newsom's message to the Democratic Party: Be more 'culturally normal' (CNN)

[valleyrogue]

57. You didn't understand the repeal of WEP/GPO.

We didn't get what we didn't earn, understand? I fucking had $174 a month stolen from my SS because of the idiot offsets from five years in Nevada public employment and because I didn't have 30 years of so-called "substantial earnings" in covered work to not have those fucking offsets attached to my SS. It was about one-fourth of my SS benefit. I have been in the labor force for nearly FIFTY years, much of it working for school districts on a nine-month "full time" employment contract. As long as I worked in classified employment in these districts, I would NEVER, EVER earn enough in a year from my job to be counted toward "substantial earnings." I would be a few hundred or a couple thousand dollars short once I went "full time" (35 hours a week, hourly) for it when I was 67 years old.

The WEP offset was calculated from a giant pension of $300 a month. If you had a "big pension" in states that didn't pay into SS, you didn't qualify for SS in the first place. To get those "big pensions," you would have to work 20, 30, or more years in the first place. Certainly not somebody like me who had just gotten my five years vesting when I was kicked to the curb.

It was a godsend to get the money back that I had EARNED.

SS isn't going "broke," either.