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203 articles on TSP rules, benchmarks, strategy, pensions and taxes, plus a daily TSP market recap.
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19 articles
FERS/CSRS & Pension Coordination
Deferred Resignation: How It Works and What It Means for Your FERS Pension
A deferred resignation lets you agree to leave federal service on a future date. Until that date you usually stay on the rolls, often on paid administrative leave. The best-known example is OPM's 2025 Deferred Resignatio...
5 min · 2026-10-11
FERS/CSRS & Pension Coordination
FEHB's 5-Year Rule: Keeping Your Health Insurance in Retirement
Many federal retirees say their FEHB coverage is worth as much as the pension itself. You can keep it for life, with the government still paying its share of the premium, but only if you meet the five-year rule when your...
5 min · 2026-10-11
FERS/CSRS & Pension Coordination
The FERS Supplement Earnings Test Explained
The FERS Supplement, also called the special retirement supplement, approximates the Social Security you earned in federal service. It's paid from your retirement until age 62. It's valuable, often several hundred to ove...
5 min · 2026-10-11
FERS/CSRS & Pension Coordination
VERA, VSIP and MRA+10: Your Federal Early-Out Options Explained
Leaving federal service before 62 doesn't have to mean a permanently smaller pension. FERS has three main routes out early: a Voluntary Early Retirement (VERA), a Voluntary Separation Incentive Payment (VSIP), and the MR...
5 min · 2026-10-11
FERS/CSRS & Pension Coordination
How the FERS Basic Annuity Is Calculated
Dana is 61, has 30 years in, and just got her first retirement estimate from her agency's HR office. She is looking at a number that is $3,000 a year lower than the figure her coworker, who is a year older, quoted over l...
5 min · 2026-05-18
FERS/CSRS & Pension Coordination
The FERS Supplement: Bridging the Gap to Social Security
Last spring a retired CBP officer sent me a note that began, "Somebody should have warned me." He had retired at 57 with 28 years of service. For five years his monthly deposit had been comfortable. Then he turned 62, an...
5 min · 2026-05-13
FERS/CSRS & Pension Coordination
CSRS vs. FERS: How Retirement Differs
Two people sat at neighboring desks in the same agency office for nearly thirty years. Marcus was hired in 1982. Priya was hired in 1996. They retire the same month, with the same $100,000 high-3 average salary and the s...
6 min · 2026-05-11
FERS/CSRS & Pension Coordination
Coordinating TSP Withdrawals With Your FERS Annuity
Dana retired from a federal agency last spring at 57 with 30 years of service. Her FERS annuity came to about $2,375 a month. Her TSP held $700,000. Her first instinct was to take a big chunk of the TSP, pay off the rema...
6 min · 2026-05-07
FERS/CSRS & Pension Coordination
When to Claim Social Security as a Federal Retiree
Marcus retired from the Department of Veterans Affairs at 58 with 31 years of service. For four years his monthly deposits included something called the FERS annuity supplement, and he barely thought about it. Then his 6...
6 min · 2026-05-04
FERS/CSRS & Pension Coordination
Military Retirement Pay and the TSP: Building a Three-Legged Stool
Master Sergeant Dana Alvarez, a made-up but very typical retiree, walked out of her transition briefing at 42 with 22 years of service and a retired pay estimate of about $3,000 a month. She felt like she had won. A frie...
6 min · 2026-05-02
FERS/CSRS & Pension Coordination
Buying Back Military Time for FERS Credit
Marcus is 51, a GS-13 at a Defense agency, and he just ran his retirement estimate for the first time. The number looked fine until he remembered the four years he spent in the Army right after high school. Nobody had ev...
5 min · 2026-04-29
FERS/CSRS & Pension Coordination
The High-3 and How Step Increases Shape Your Pension
Marcus sat in the back row of a retirement seminar, pen tapping, with a question he'd clearly been rehearsing. His next step increase was eleven weeks after his planned retirement date. Was it worth staying?
5 min · 2026-04-26