Are You Wondering If Opers is a Good Retirement Plan?? That depends on what your goals are. OPERS offers three plans that may help you meet these objectives, each of which has unique benefits and requirements; we suggest consulting your HR representative or retirement specialist prior to selecting one of them; you could also check out our Plan Selection Workbook, New Hire video or Pension & Healthcare Eligibility Guide as resources that can assist in making this decision easier for you.
OPERS is extremely well-funded and has experienced higher rates of return than its estimated return over the past 10 years, increasing its funded ratio to 85 percent and far surpassing the national average of 74%.
We have an outstanding track record of prudent management that has produced strong returns on investments. Six out of the past 10 years saw more than their actual rate of return generated through OPERS investments.
Defined Benefit (DB) plans use accumulated contributions and investment earnings to provide members with a lifetime monthly pension upon retirement, making this type of plan most people’s image of a retirement plan. An advantage of a defined benefit plan is that it takes away some of the risk associated with investing your own money for retirement as your employer has already done that work on your behalf.
OPERS’s Traditional Pension Plan, in which 95 percent of its members participate, determines your retirement benefit based on a formula calculated using your final average salary plus years of service times a contribution factor. Furthermore, this plan offers disability and survivorship protections which could protect your family in case of illness or accident.
If you are a new employee who starts in non-law enforcement/public safety positions but later begins work covered by OPERS, state law dictates that you begin contributing to the Traditional Plan as soon as possible. State regulations do not permit maintaining separate plans but pooling service credit from both plans together.
If you retire at age 50 or later from either the Traditional or Combined plans, and wish to take a Partial Lump Sum Option Payment (PLOP), which entitles you to take 100 percent of the member contributions and annuitize the remaining portion of your account, you have the option to elect for a Partial Lump Sum Option Payment (PLOP). After retirement, you’ll receive a monthly retirement allowance equal to a percentage of your final average salary, which will be adjusted each year with inflation using cost-of-living adjustments. Your Statement of Benefit Payment will update whenever your annuitized account changes, or when your choice to annuitize all or part of it and receive lifetime payments changes. In that instance, your annuity will be adjusted the following year; those opting to refund membership can do so after their death.