Senate OKs bill to boost benefits for thousands of Louisiana workers. Biden is expected to sign it

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

61% : Many of those employees held jobs before or after their public service, or worked second jobs -- such as teachers often take at night and during the summer -- that contributed to Social Security.
57% : Over the years, opponents noted that Social Security pays benefits based on a formula that involves contributions but is not a dollar-for-dollar return on taxes paid.
56% : The Windfall Elimination Provision, called WEP, reduces Social Security benefits by up to half the pension amount for people receiving pension income from jobs that didn't contribute Social Security payroll taxes.
56% : Both provisions were added to the law in the early 1980s to help shore up ailing Social Security finances.
54% : The Government Pension Offset, or GPO, reduces benefits for survivors if the spouse had a pension that wasn't taxed for Social Security.
54% : Removing the two provisions costs $196 billion, which could hasten insolvency of the fund that pays Social Security.
53% : But the formula that determines the amount of benefits for a retiree recognized only the job that contributed into the system, which because of the lower wages resulted in "over generous" benefits to public servants who also received pensions that had not contributed to Social Security.
52% : Opponents argued that public service employees were unfairly augmenting their retirements with Social Security benefits when they also had state or municipal pensions that had not paid into Social Security.
52% : The effected public workers countered their jobs that contributed to Social Security were separate from their public employment that did not pay taxes, thus retirement benefits were earned separately.

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