Does your hospital offer a pension?

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Every corporation and hospital offers a self-funded 401K with a match. However, are pensions a thing of the past or do you have one at your hospital?

There is not a day that goes by that I do not wonder about retirement. I expect to provide most of my income at that time because I expect Social Security to be bankrupt at that time. So I am planning ahead now because I want to retire early and enjoy my life!

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Specializes in Nursing Professional Development.
I don't know a lot about pensions, but I believe the hospital I just started working for is good. I can start contributing up to 8% of my pay and they match 50%. I did choose 8%. If or when I choose to leave, I can roll it over. The hospital has various stocks they can invest it for you or you can choose. I'd love to hear what anyone else thinks!

That sounds like a pretty tyical 403B or 401k plan -- about average. The trick is to make sure you are contributing regularly. The best thing to do is have it deducted automatically from each paycheck. Over the years it will build up to a healthy amount as long as you never take anything out of the account or borrow from it. Chosse sensible investments that you understand within your account and you'll probably do just fine. People usually screw up when they try to get to fancy and/or make a quick buck by gambling with their retirment money.

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There is not a day that goes by that I do not wonder about retirement. I expect to provide most of my income at that time because I expect Social Security to be bankrupt at that time. So I am planning ahead now because I want to retire early and enjoy my life!

SS will not fail. There will need to be some tweaks but the reality is that IF NOTHING IS DONE that SS will be able to pay between 75-80% of promised benefits into (drum roll) infinity. Al Franken has an excellent chapter in his book "The truth with Jokes" about SS.

I applaud your personal savings plan but be very fee aware because the investment fees can eat up to 30% of your return on investment.

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My hospital does not offer a pension but we have a 401K in which if the employee invests at least 1% of salary, the company invests 6% of our annual salary. It is a good plan. I did work for another hospital for 8 years which had a pension plan and I will get about $300 per month at retirement from them. I wish we could have a system like teachers where all our years of service count so we could retire after 30 years with about 80% of our pay AND health insurance. Still dreaming.

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The State of Mississippi offers the following.

Cafeteria Plan: This allows you to pay certain expenses (dependent care expenses, health and dental insurance premiums, medical and dental expenses) with money taken from your pay before it is taxed.

State of MS Retirement Plan: MDOT is covered under the Public Employees Retirement System. Fully eligible to retire after 25 years of service. Fully vested after 4 years of service. The employee contributes 7.25% of their salary and the state contributes 9.75%.

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More 401k's then anything here. Most nurses who retired on a hospital pension are still working somewhere part time or per diem.

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Specializes in Critical Care.

Yes, my current employer offers both a pension and employer matched retirement accounts.

~faith,

Timothy.

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Specializes in Critical Care.
SS will not fail. There will need to be some tweaks but the reality is that IF NOTHING IS DONE that SS will be able to pay between 75-80% of promised benefits into (drum roll) infinity. Al Franken has an excellent chapter in his book "The truth with Jokes" about SS.

I applaud your personal savings plan but be very fee aware because the investment fees can eat up to 30% of your return on investment.

Not to be always combative with you, but that presumes that all those IOUs the gov't has been cashing out of the SS program will be available, drumroll, into infinity. And THAT presumes that the gov't, in addition to those IOUs, can continue to pay a 9 trillion dollar and growing debt. Those are big IFs.

I don't think SS will fail. I DO think that it will eventually, of necessity, be partially privatized (interestingly, President Clinton was an advocate of this). Direct transfers of wealth work great when the ratio of retiree to worker is 17:1 (as it was when SS started). It is currently 3:1, moving to 2:1. A more consistent way to wealth, as ANY financial person will tell you, is the miracle of compound interest. If designed TODAY, with modern life expectancies, SS would be mandated IRA accounts.

In any case, for SS to survive, some hard decisions will have to be made. SSA.gov will tell you that, if you look. I personally think that, in about 20 yrs, when the situation becomes more dire, benefits will be means tested. If you are younger than 40 and intend to have lots of personal retirement money saved, don't be surprised if you are bumped from SS rolls. I even agree with this. If you are the highest beneficiaries of this great society, then congrats.

Not to worry, though. You would STILL be safer with those personal accounts. SS is in for a rough ride. It just wasn't a system designed for 2:1 worker to beneficiary.

Off topic specifically, but generally on topic to retirement.

~faith,

Timothy.

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