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Your Pension Plan

Move the sliders and see what retiring at 20 years instead of 23 (FDNY) or 25 (NYPD), your overtime years and the yearly increase do to your pension.

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Sirmium Capital · Sample plan · October 2026

Sample plan: how it works

A walk-through of the pension decisions for an FDNY member: when to retire, your best three years, the survivor option and the 457. Move the sliders and the plan updates.

Show the example for

Every figure here is made up. The member, the family and every dollar amount are examples, chosen to show how a plan works. None of it is a real person's data. The real rules on the page are the state laws on the Tier 3 pension (half the final average pay at 20 years), when its yearly increase starts, and how the final average pay is limited each year.

Summary

Pension health score

Step 3 · Analyzing your course of action

Pension and inflation

Years past 20 don't raise a Tier 3 pension. They decide the yearly increase below. Rank-based additions at 25 years are not shown. Tier 2 works differently: it adds 1/60 of the pay earned after year 20, roughly 1.67% of the final average for each extra year if pay stays level. That percentage is an approximation.

Example monthly pension at retirement

Full yearly increaseNo increase

YearsRetire atMonthly at startYearly increaseAt age 75
Plan assumptions

Inflation

Shrinks what a pension with no yearly increase buys.
Show amounts in
What $1 today buys in 20 years

A figure in today's dollars buys what that many dollars buy now. Future dollars are the larger numbers you'd see printed on a statement.

Step 3 · Analyzing your course of action

Your best three years

Your tier
YearPay earnedLimitPay that counts
2 years beforeNoneSets the limit
1 year beforeNoneSets the limit
Year 1
Year 2
Year 3 (last)

Estimated final average

One big year or a steady ramp

One big year

Year 3 pay
Thrown out
Final average
Pension a year

Steady ramp: your years above

Year 3 pay
Thrown out
Final average
Pension a year

This is an estimate. The Fund makes the final number when you retire, using its own payroll records.

Step 3 · Analyzing your course of action

Survivor income

When you file for the pension, you choose an option on the Fund's form. The choice decides what your spouse receives if you die first. Pick one below.

Your pension
Monthly cost
$0
Spouse receives
No pension

Your pension
Monthly cost
Spouse receives

Your pension
Monthly cost
$210 (ex.)
Spouse receives
$600,000 once

Step 3 · Analyzing your course of action

Keep the 457 or move it to an IRA

Example: $150,000 in the 457 at retirement, compared over 20 years. The 457 costs an example 0.03% a year. Money in a governmental 457 has no 10% early-withdrawal penalty before 59½; moved to an IRA, it loses that.

IRA after 20 years, 10% before fee

10% before fee

IRA growth after fee
IRA at 20 yrs
457 at 20 yrs
Difference

Break-even

IRA growth needed
IRA at 20 yrs
457 at 20 yrs
Difference
$0

Bad markets

IRA ahead in
Middle result
Worst 1 in 10
457 at 20 yrs

Steps 4 and 5 · Developing and presenting recommendations

Decisions your plan answers

This sample shows the decisions and what moves them. A full plan answers each one with your own figures.

    Steps 6 and 7 · Implementing and monitoring

    Next steps (example dates)

    Your own plan

    What working with us adds

    This sample runs on made-up figures and simplified rules. A plan with us runs on yours.

    This sampleYour plan with us
    FiguresMade-up examplesYour Fund estimate letter and your 457, IRA and Social Security statements
    Pension rulesA simplified example formulaYour tier, your increase date and your offset, from the Fund's numbers
    ReviewYou read it aloneA one-on-one review with our team, with time for your questions
    UpdatesFixed as of October 2026Updated every year with new Fund and account figures
    AccountsNot includedHelp opening the IRA, if you decide to move money
    PaperworkNot includedHelp with the rollover paperwork, step by step
    Planning is free. If you hire us to manage your investments, the fee for first responders and veterans is 1% a year of the assets we manage. There's no obligation to hire us after the plan.
    Good to have ready
    • Your pension estimate or service-credit letter
    • Your latest 457 and IRA statements
    • Your Social Security statement
    • Any life insurance policies

    Next: your full retirement plan →

    Contents

    Read the rest of the plan

    The rest works through the pension choices you only get to make once: your best three years, the survivor option and what to do with the 457.

    1. 01Pension health scoreRead
    2. 02Pension and inflationRead
    3. 03InflationLocked
    4. 04Your best three yearsLocked
    5. 05Survivor incomeLocked
    6. 06Keep the 457 or move it to an IRALocked
    7. 07Decisions your plan answersLocked
    8. 08Next stepsLocked
    9. 3 more chapters

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    Sources for the rules on this page
    • No 10% early-withdrawal penalty on governmental 457 distributions, and the exception for money rolled in from other plans: IRS Topic No. 558, irs.gov/taxtopics/tc558 (read October 14, 2026).
    • The full yearly increase at 23 years for FDNY and 25 years for NYPD Tier 3 members, the 3% cap and the 1/36-per-month reduction: N.Y. Retirement and Social Security Law §510(b)(2), (b)(2-a) and (c), the (b)(2-a) FDNY date added by Chapter 58 of the Laws of 2026, Part ZZ.
    • Tier 3 service pension of 50% of final average salary at 20 years, with no increase for more years: N.Y. Retirement and Social Security Law §505 and §505(d) (NYPD, 20 years under Chapter 55 of the Laws of 2025, Part SS) and Chapter 692 of the Laws of 2025 (FDNY). Tier 2's 1/60 of earnings after year 20: NYC Police Pension Fund Tier 2 booklet, June 2026, p.19, and the FDNY Tier 1 and 2 pension manual.
    • Best three years and the yearly limit on counted pay: N.Y. Retirement and Social Security Law §512(a) (Tier 3, 10%) and §443 (Tier 2, 20%, greater of the last year or the three-year average), with Chapter 312 of the Laws of 2026 for NYPD Tier 2 members hired on or after July 1, 2000 and Chapter 540 of the Laws of 2021 for FDNY. Pay that never counts for NYPD members: NYC Police Pension Fund Tier 2 booklet, June 2026, p.17.
    • Every pension, Social Security, tax, return and cost figure is an example chosen for this sample. Nothing else here uses the Fund's actual formula or this year's tax tables.

    If you move the 457 to an IRA we manage, we are paid on it. If you leave it in the 457, we are not.

    Sirmium Capital LLC is a New York state-registered investment adviser and is not registered with the SEC. Every figure in this document describes odds under a set of assumptions; a projection is not a promise and nobody can promise an investment outcome. Nothing here is an offer or a solicitation in any jurisdiction where we are not registered or exempt, and nothing here creates an advisory relationship; ongoing advisory services are provided only under a signed advisory agreement. Your accountant and your attorney are the right people for tax and legal questions, and their answers beat ours.