Wisconsin Retirement System (WRS)
Retirement Benefits Calculator Disclaimer

The WRS Retirement Benefits Calculator allows you to enter data to calculate an unofficial projection of your WRS retirement benefits. This is not an official WRS estimate. You should use this calculator as a tool to understand your WRS retirement benefit as a portion of your retirement income. The information on your most recent Statement of Benefits may be helpful in determining the data to enter for your benefit projection. If you are considering retiring within one year, please contact us for an official estimate.

The Retirement Benefits Calculator is designed to project retirement benefits for most of our members. In order to be eligible for retirement benefits, you must meet the vesting requirement based on when your WRS employment began. If you have an exceptionally complex account, you may want to see the Calculating Your Retirement Benefits brochure for more information.

The calculator:

• Uses the data you enter and does not compare that data against your actual WRS account. It is not connected to the actual WRS database where your individual account data is maintained.
• Will show the higher of the formula or money purchase calculation from your required contributions if you enter the data necessary for a formula benefit calculation and your projected money purchase balance.
• Will calculate a formula benefit based on creditable service in multiple employment categories.
• Will provide all of the monthly annuity and lump sum benefit amounts for which you are eligible. If you are interested in the eligibility requirements for a lump sum payment, please see the minimum monthly amount restriction in the Calculating Your Retirement Benefits brochure.
• Will use a projected age-62 Social Security benefit amount from a table based on your year of birth and final average WRS earnings to calculate your Accelerated Payment option amounts unless you enter a specific projected Social Security benefit amount. You must enter your three highest years of earnings and the service in those years in order for us to determine your projected Social Security benefits.
• Calculates monthly and lump sum benefit amounts from any additional contribution balance that you enter.
• Adds the benefit increase from any employer additional contribution amount that you enter to the retirement annuity amounts from your required contributions. The benefit from employer additional contributions will not be shown separately as a benefit from additional contributions.
• Calculates the variable adjustment to formula benefits if you participate in the variable program and enter your projected variable excess/deficiency balance. You may want to use the Variable Excess/Deficiency Calculator to project your future variable excess/deficiency balance. Additional information is also available in the How Participation in the Variable Trust Affects Your WRS Benefits brochure.

The calculator does not:

• Project future interest crediting or contributions to your account. Your retirement benefit projection will be based only on the dollar amount(s) that you enter.
• Calculate your retirement benefit for a retirement date that is before the earliest age at which you are eligible for a retirement benefit. Your earliest retirement age is 55, or age 50 if you have some WRS creditable service in a protective occupation category.* Exception: If your only protective occupation category service is purchased service, such as forfeited protective service that you have purchased, your earliest retirement age is 55.
• Calculate your formula retirement benefit accurately if you terminated employment before July 1, 1990. The actuarial reduction for early retirement may be incorrect if you terminated WRS employment before July 1, 1990, and the formula multipliers will also be wrong if you terminated WRS employment before March 9, 1984.
• Calculate an accurate formula retirement benefit if you are an alternate payee or a participant whose account has been divided by a Qualified Domestic Relations Order (QDRO) and you are under the normal retirement age for your employment category (65 for general, teacher and educational support employees, 62 for elected officials and executive retirement plan participants, and 53 or 54 for protectives). In most cases this calculator will show benefit amounts that are less than the amounts for which you would actually be eligible. Exception: If you will still have at least 30 years of creditable service when you retire (25 years for protectives), even though a portion of your service was awarded to your former spouse, the formula calculation will be accurate.
• Calculate your formula retirement benefit accurately if you are under normal retirement age, have part-time service in 5 of the last 10 years prior to retirement, and have partial years of non-teaching creditable service. If you meet the "part-time service in 5 of the last 10 years prior to retirement" eligibility criteria, each partial year of non-teaching service is converted to the amount of service credit you would have received if your hours had been credited as a teacher, but only for the purpose of calculating your actuarial reduction for early retirement.
• Take into account IRS requirements under 26 U.S.C. 401(a)(17), which limits the amount of compensation that can be considered when calculating certain defined benefits for employees who first became WRS participants on or after January 1, 1996. That limit may restrict your final benefit.

This calculator is a tool you can use to help project your future benefits; there is no guarantee that you will receive these amounts. The accuracy of the benefit projection will depend on how closely the data you enter matches your actual WRS account data in the future. The actual WRS benefit that you receive when you retire must be calculated under the provisions of Chapter 40, Wisconsin State Statutes.

I have read this disclaimer and I am ready to do a calculation.