re: Where should I start throwing my money?

quote:

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I apologize for being ignorant, but I am on this: I have not been taught. What exactly is a pension? I am a school teacher and coach. I have benefits, but don't fully understand them to the nth degree, yet.

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If you work for a public school system, you very likely have a pension plan. Your first step should be to get the basic information on your contributions, where they go, are you also contributing to social security, if you have any control over your pension contributions - and the tax consequences.

The basics of a pension are: you work for x number of years and are entitled to y amount of money for life (a "life" pension). Sometimes they take money out of your check to fund it - sometimes it is funded externally. Sometimes you don't make Social Security retirement contributions (and are, therefore, ineligible for SS retirement benefits - just medicare), and sometimes you do and they factor in both the pension plan AND SS retirement as part of your retirement "package" (with a third element being, typically, some form of 401K or employer-sponsored IRA).

However, current pension structures are so variable and fluid, you need to check your particulars. Some allow "early" retirement, though there are also IRS regs, penalties, etc., so you need to determine when the sweet spot is, or where the various tiers are so that your planning outside of the pension syncs up with that.

Hope this helps!