A Texas lawmaker has introduced legislation that would replace the windfall elimination provision (WEP) with a new formula that adjusts Social Security retirement benefits for public employees in a way that reflects their level of participation in the program.

WEP slashes the Social Security retirement benefits that can be received by most individuals who collect a pension from a job that was not covered by the program, using a rather blunt formula that does not change until a person exceeds 20 years of work under Social Security.

H.R. 4391 from Republican Rep. Kevin Brady would determine the amount of Social Security benefits to be received by a person who would otherwise be subject to WEP by calculating the individual's unadjusted benefit, then multiplying it by the percentage of career earnings that were subject to Social Security taxes. So, if a retiree had average monthly wages of $3,300, with half of that amount coming from work covered by Social Security, his unadjusted benefit – if he did not collect a pension from a non-covered job – would be about $1,411. When that figure is multiplied by the amount of earnings that were subject to Social Security taxes – 50 percent – his monthly Social Security retirement benefit is found to be about $705. This is $129 more than he would have received under the current WEP formula. It is still, however, about $178 less than he would receive if both WEP and the new proposal were disregarded and his benefits were computed by simply applying the standard formula to the earnings on which he paid Social Security taxes.

Some individuals may be worse off under the new formula than they would have been with WEP but congressional aides say most would fare better with Brady's proposal.

There is talk on Capitol Hill that if this effort is successful, something similar could be attempted with the government pension offset (GPO), which reduces or eliminates spousal and survivor's Social Security benefits for most retirees who collect pensions from non-covered jobs.