General Discussion

You could have always taken a job in the public sector. That was your choice. I PAID into SS for 41 years and counting, yet because I had a grand total of 5.04 years in service credit in Nevada public employment getting a piddling $341 and did not get 30 years of "substantial earnings," I got SCREWED out of $120 a month out of my SS that I earned. The big stink is if a person worked 30 years in "substantial earnings," which always went up, then the WEP would not apply. 30 years is completely arbitrary and based on the outdated notion people worked at one employer their entire working career before retiring. For many of us, that was not true and continues not to be true. I had many low years. I currently work a nine-month (full time) classified position in school district employment in Oregon, but my earnings fell just short of reaching the "substantial earnings" threshold. I am almost 70 years old and can't work forever. WEP was completely unfair to people like me who were trying to make up for the low earning years.