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View Poll Results: Do you have a pension?
Government Pension 166 29.23%
Corporate Pension 195 34.33%
No pension, just SS & savings 207 36.44%
Voters: 568. You may not vote on this poll

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Old 05-13-2021, 12:26 PM   #121
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No pension here other than SS which we’re not old enough to start taking yet.
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Old 05-13-2021, 12:35 PM   #122
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Originally Posted by disneysteve View Post
I'm surprised by the poll results - 60% have pensions (I'm in the other 40%). I expected that number to be a lot lower.
Some of us, including me, have pensions but they were frozen when the company phased them out for new employees while keeping some of the pension program for others.

My frozen pension covered about 17% of my peak, FT salary. But because I twice reduced my weekly hours worked starting the year (2001) they froze my pension, by the time I ERed, that same pension eventually represented about 42% of my final, PT salary.

That cash-balance substitute (how many of you have that type of retirement program?) can pay, as a monthly benefit, about 6% of my PT salary.
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Old 05-13-2021, 12:53 PM   #123
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The real issue for those with pension income is the amount of the pension, whether or not it is has a cola adjustment, other DB pension benefits such as dental, eyecare, , and finally...how much of your retirement expenses are covered by pensions.
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Old 05-13-2021, 12:58 PM   #124
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I have a government pension that covers around 65% of my final salary. It has a small COLA and a 75% survivorship option. I also had a 457b that I rolled over into a tIRA, of which I'm now starting to convert to a Roth. Haven't claimed SS yet at 64. We also consider ourselves extremely fortunate.
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Old 05-13-2021, 01:00 PM   #125
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I have a small non-COLA corporate pension. It's about 20% of my final base pay. It could have been a lot bigger but I quit at 52 and started collecting immediately. DW has a government pension from a municipality in Texas. It has a partial COLA (70% of CPI) and represents 65% of her final pay. The two pensions combined cover roughly 50-60% of our expenses.

We also both have retiree health insurance through our prior employers. The subsidy on those is equivalent to about half my pension.
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Old 05-13-2021, 01:01 PM   #126
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CalPERS retirement and I'm embarrassed to say just how much it is, almost criminal. I also get 100% medical and dental for life for both myself and wife.

I never talk about my retirement benefits in front of family or friends. Most of my fellow retirees do the same simply because most people get angry over it.

I’m CalPERs too. And on my lane I have a retired CHP officer and a couple from State Tax Board. We all wave and smile when we see each other at the mail box. No words exchanged but we all know we have comfortable pensions.
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Old 05-13-2021, 01:38 PM   #127
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Nope, no pension. Megacorp turned it into a cash balance plan about halfway in...... well, I suppose I could have taken an annuitized payout instead of lump sum - does that count as pension?
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Old 05-13-2021, 03:37 PM   #128
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I'll be getting a corporate pension when I retire.
Megacorp froze our pensions in 2008.
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Old 05-13-2021, 03:51 PM   #129
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I think it is quite telling that (according to this poll at least) almost 2/3 of the participants on this board have a corp or govt pension. This is a far higher percentage than the typical American. https://www.cnbc.com/2020/01/17/here...nt-income.html

Just goes to show that FI is remarkably difficult without a pension.
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Old 05-13-2021, 04:34 PM   #130
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what does SIRE stand for?
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Old 05-13-2021, 04:52 PM   #131
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No pensions here. When I started Megacorp in 84 they said no pension but we have profit sharing. They contributed 10% of our wages into a private fund. A year later a coworker did a presentation on how compounding with past returns projected out. Numbers said we'd have a million in 20 years. Didn't quite work out but there was changes due to a 401k addition, we still could get the 10% but you had to contribute some too.

DW gets 1400, SS today, I'm planning waiting till 70 as I'll get close to the maximum amount.
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Old 05-13-2021, 04:54 PM   #132
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what does SIRE stand for?
SIRE - Secure Income, Retired Early

SI generally applied to pensions, FI depends on personal assets for income.

https://www.early-retirement.org/for...rum-34884.html
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Old 05-13-2021, 04:59 PM   #133
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I have a federal pension.
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Old 05-13-2021, 05:07 PM   #134
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Originally Posted by Midpack View Post
SIRE - Secure Income, Retired Early

SI generally applied to pensions, FI depends on personal assets for income.

https://www.early-retirement.org/for...rum-34884.html
Thank you
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Old 05-13-2021, 06:42 PM   #135
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DH has two corporate (non-cola) pensions, fully funded by the company, and totals about $46K/yr. Forty years in with four more months to go until ER!
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Old 05-13-2021, 06:58 PM   #136
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I have a University of California COLA’d pension plus Social Security now. I forget what % of my salary it is. I want to say 75% but that was 10 years ago and the cost of living increases have increased that now. I have some savings on top of that. I lost 20% of those savings in the 2009 crash but that wasn’t enough to deter my ER decision. I am now living in Thailand so my pension provides a comfortable lifestyle and I can still save some.
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Old 05-13-2021, 07:39 PM   #137
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Pensions pay approx 75 percent of our pre covid spending expenses. They cover our entire living expenses during covid with excess monies sent to saving.

Savings this year will pay for our new roof! Given the choice, we would rather have travelled and pulled the rood money from investments.
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Old 05-13-2021, 08:30 PM   #138
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I will have a federal pension in my 60's, but if I FIRE it will not be much.
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Old 05-13-2021, 10:41 PM   #139
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I retired from the military almost 3 years ago after 26 years w/ pension and va disability. Combined equal more than my active base pay by a good bit. Both have historically been sufficiently cola'd.
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Old 05-13-2021, 11:08 PM   #140
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I'm thinking the poll results were skewed by the title. I have no pension but DH has not not only a private pension from the current job, but recently got a mailing that outlined another micro-pension (private). That jogged the memory about a third, private micro-pension. I thought that was unusual until I saw Alan's response.
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