Posted on 01/13/2019 12:11:20 PM PST by Chickensoup
I have a Question about National Guard and Retirement. If someone is in the guard and has 20 years in do they retire like a person in the other military services do?
Is it different?
If they were in the Baby Guard in High school does that somehow count towards retirement?
Is it different?
If they were in the Baby Guard in High school does that somehow count towards retirement?
If someone is in the guard and has 20 years in do they retire like a person in the other military services do?
Is it different?
Yes, but it is a prorated retirement based on the number of days served over the 20 years, and does not begin until age 60. Benefits like Tricare also begin at 60.
If they were in the Baby Guard in High school does that somehow count towards retirement?
No, the Junior ROTC program (which is not the National Guard) does not count.
Thank you, that is all I needed to know
Unless it changed since i was in, 20 years in the guard all have to be good years. You have to accumulate points per year. If short, that year don’t count and must be made up. I believe you must have 60 points per year (15 for AT; 4 per month for weekend duty). Also, you can ‘retire’ after 20 years but must wait until you’re of age (I think 60 y/o). I don’t know about Baby Guard, never heard of it. Someone else can comment on that. Also, if I am wrong on anything, pls correct me.
It’s 50 points a year for a good year.
And before you finish with the reserve or NG make sure you get a “20 Year Letter” stating you have 20 good years and are eligible for retirement which begins at age 60.
My wife’s sister joined the Air Force just out of high school. She was alternatively active in the guard and the regular Air Force for 27 years, sometimes active as a liaison between the two. But she was never a part timer, so I am not sure if that is what you are talking about. Since she was full time in both the Guard and the regular Air Force she started collecting all of her benefits as soon as she retired and did not have to wait.
Our Brother-in-law is currently a “wing commander”, full bird colonel in the California National Guard. He is currently full time active in the Guard, but he has also been full time in both the Guard and the regular Air Force. During part of his career he was part time in the Guard. He is getting close to 60 when he will be forced to retire with around 40 years in, since he joined the Air Force enlisted when he was just out of high school and then went on to Officer Candidate School and got a degree in electrical engineering as well.
Both of them are quite good at maximizing their retirement benefits.
They are what’s called “Active National Guard” or ANG. When I was in the USAR, we had a SSG who was our S1 and he was an Active Duty Soldier assigned to our Reserve unit.
It’s sort of the same but different. Active duty 20 years, you get 365 points per year. National Guard or Reserves, you get 60 points per year. So your check is about 1/6 of an active duty retiree. But if called to active duty, you of course, acquire more points.
In MA the guard retirement kicks in at retirement age, not if you are 48, for example.
So the responses have been correct, but it has recently changed. Once you hit your retirement eligibility at the 20-year mark, You’ll get a letter detailing that. You can’t take pension until you hit 60, except for some special circumstances.
You receive a base pension of I think 2.5%, based on your highest three months of pay when you get out, multiplied by the number of equivalent years you served. Guard time maxes out at 130 points per year, while active duty time is the full 365. So you’ll add up all your points to find out how many full-time years you were equivalent to, and that’ll determine how high of a pension you get. So, any deployments, ADOS (Active Duty - Operational Support), AGR (Active Guard/Reserve), etc will increase your effective number of years compared to the base Guard time. So you can, between AGR and staying in for more than 20 years, manage to hit enough time to get the full pension as active duty does.
Recently, though, they changed this to where you now only have a 2% (maybe 1.5%) multiplier, but they now match some of your TPS contributions (401k essentially). Most current Guard had to choose between the old system or the new one. The main point of this was to help all the people that didn’t stay in the full 20, to get them more into their retirement plans, since before you had to get either 20 years, or have zero gov retirement help. Now they help you a bit.
JROTC does nothing for military. Real ROTC (college level) is iffy. I believe service academies are credited for retirement time, but ROTC is usually not. UNLESS, you are in the Guard and part of the SMP program, where you still do regular drills with your unit. ROTC stuff won’t usually count, but the Guard stuff still will.
Glad I went AD, retired at 37.
Joined the Air National Guard in ‘67 so I didn’t have to worry about getting drafted while in college. Did a lot of extra drills on weekends, short tours of active duty in the summer between semesters, and specialist schools. Germany twice and Korea once were great breaks from school when you are young and restless. Finally took an AGR job in ‘81 and retired in 2000. Total Active Duty somehow added up to over 29 years and my first retirement pay was the month after I retired.
Life is good.
Points earned are based on how many drills, etc.
Typical - you get 15 ‘participation points - just for being in the system.
Then - 1 weekend a month is four 4-hour drills = 48 per year.
That adds up to 63 points.
Go on annual training - 2 weeks - starts on 1 Monday - ends the 2nd Friday - you get 12 points. So - now you are up to 75 points.
Do correspondence course - add more points. Do some additional training - more points. Volunteer to go on a 1 or 2 month support period - even more points.
You need a minimum of 50 points for a ‘good year’.
After 20 good years...add up points, divide by 360 - and that is the equivalent years (compared to active duty). [Or - keep drilling past 20 - and get more points.]
Say someone has 3200 points....that is 8.8 years. Old retirement system - you get 2.5% of base salary of your rank per year....for 8.888 x 2.5 = 22.2%. And - you wait til age 60 to start drawing the retirement. And at age 60 - you become eligible for Tricare - and then Tricare for Life at age 65. (Tricare for Life becomes your ‘supplemental Medicare and your Prescription Part D’ - all costing about $275/year for a single person, or $550 for husband and wife.)
AND - for someone with active duty time - they get 365 points for every active duty year. For an incomplete year - they get 1 point for every day on active duty.
One must be in the reserves for at least 8 years to get a reserve retirement....meaning someone with say 16 years of active duty time must still put in 8 years reserve time to get that reserve retirement...can’t stop at 20 (16 active + 4 reserve)...
Thank you.
Thanks, this was never explained to me by my wife's sister, Super Senior Master Sgt. Estie (she had a fit when ever I called her that) or her husband Col. Bob. But I now understand how they were able to stay in the same places for so long while their kids were growing up.
After their oldest daughter got back from serving in the Middle East, she took a similar type of reserve position and she and her new husband bought a house near by.
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