Last month, the Commonwealth Court decided the case of White v. Workers’ Compensation Appeals Board (City of Pittsburgh) , which dealt with the constitutional question of whether the “old age” retirement benefit offset provision of Section 204(a) of the Workers’ Compensation Act violates the equal protection requirement of the Pennsylvania Constitution. Specifically, the court had to decide whether the section imposes an unequal burden on the indemnity benefits of a claimant solely on the basis of age. The issue was framed this way since only “old age” or “retirement” Social Security benefits may be offset under the act, as opposed to Social Security disability benefits, among others.

The claimant in White , Rose White, was injured in the course and scope of her employment on Nov. 2, 1996, and received workers’ compensation benefits for close to 11 years, at which time the employer, the city of Pittsburgh, filed a Notice of Workers’ Compensation Benefit Offset on Aug. 27, 2007, according to the opinion. This bureau document, authorized under Section 204 of the act, notified the claimant that since she was receiving Social Security retirement benefits, the employer would begin taking a 50 percent offset of her Social Security benefits starting on Sept. 17, 2007. On Oct. 25, 2007, the claimant filed a review petition, challenging the offset unilaterally imposed by the employer. Essentially, the claimant argued that the defendant was not entitled to an offset for 50 percent of the entire amount of her Social Security benefits because a portion of the amount she received was a “widow benefit,” which was exclusively attributable to her deceased husband’s earnings, or annual cost-of-living increases in her Social Security benefits.

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