How It Works
A practical workflow for comparing retirement timing and income.
FERSCalc is meant to give near-retirement federal employees a clearer planning view before they rely on official estimates, spreadsheets, or final professional advice.
1. Gather Inputs
Start with the facts you already know.
The calculator is usable with partial information, but it gets stronger as you add salary, retirement dates, Social Security, FEHB, and TSP details.
2. Build Scenarios
Compare tradeoffs instead of chasing one number.
FERSCalc is strongest when you compare retirement dates, household setups, and drawdown assumptions instead of treating the first projection as final truth.
3. Review Output
Interpret results as planning context.
The results are designed to help you understand cash flow, timing sensitivity, and uncertainty, then take sharper questions into your final decision process.
What To Have Ready
- Birth date, service start date, and target retirement date
- Your FERS coverage details, especially if you are under 6C law enforcement, firefighter, or ATC retirement rules
- High-3 salary, current salary, and TSP balances
- Estimated Social Security figures from your statement
- FEHB and Medicare assumptions that matter to your household
What You Get Back
- Monthly retirement income estimates and tax-adjusted net income
- Scenario comparison for retirement timing decisions
- Withdrawal-source comparison when more than one shipped withdrawal-source mode applies
- TSP drawdown context, threshold-aware guardrails, longevity indicators, and Monte Carlo results
- Optional historical stress scenarios (Results → Stress) that replay bundled annual market data on your projection timeline for context — separate from the main static-rate run
- Fixed annual after-retirement TSP in-plan Roth conversion planning
- Shareable scenario links plus printable and exportable summaries
Local-First Workflow
Your scenario data stays with your browser.
FERSCalc runs locally in the browser and stores calculator scenarios on your device. You do not need an account to use it.
The current workflow can compare shipped withdrawal-source modes when more than one applies, and it can model fixed annual after-retirement TSP in-plan Roth conversions without pretending those settings are a full lifetime optimizer.
Exports are created in your browser and saved where you choose. Share links are point-in-time snapshots, and saved scenarios do not follow you across devices automatically.
Current support includes standard FERS contribution tiers, 6C special-category retirement, and state income tax modeling for all 50 states and DC.
Use the output to sharpen decisions, not to skip due diligence.
FERSCalc is built to help you ask better questions and compare options more clearly. It is not a substitute for official benefit verification, tax advice, or legal guidance.