Email Your Rep.
Dear [NAME],
As your constituent, a registered voter, and a teacher in [SCHOOL DISTRICT], I’m writing to express my concerns with the Texas Teacher Retirement System.
The system as it’s set up does not put every teacher on the pathway to a secure retirement. In fact, less than 20 percent of educators will ever reach a point where they receive a full pension and 45 percent of new hires will leave the profession before qualifying for one. We would not accept only 1-in-5 students passing their classes, or close to half of them dropping out of the public school system—teachers should be treated the same way.
Yet in recent years, policy decisions regarding teachers’ retirements have both lacked educators’ voices and negatively affected our benefits. Contribution rates—money taken out of teachers’ paychecks—have risen since the Great Recession, with no increase in benefits, and are on track to reach 8.25 percent by 2024. This is especially harmful to teachers who don’t collect Social Security. Furthermore, the state has cut benefits for new hires in recent years. Such decisions limit districts’ abilities to recruit and retain high-quality teachers.
Among other changes, I ask that you to consider the following improvements to TRS outlined by Texas Teachers for Retirement Solutions.
1. Ensure that future changes to teacher retirement benefits are guided by three essential principles:
Choice, Guarantees, and Agency: Teachers should have choices, including retirement options that offer both guarantees and agency.
Portability is Key: Teachers should have the ability to keep the retirement income they’ve earned throughout their career, no matter where they teach or for how long.
Prioritize Financial Education: Teachers should have the educational information they need to make informed decisions about their financial future.
2. Account for the retirement needs of all teachers, not just those who will work a full career. We recommend the following:
Offer new teachers multiple retirement options so that they can choose a plan that best meets their needs, financial goals and priorities, and future plans.
Allow current teachers the option to switch from their current retirement plan into one of these new options.
Reduce the current, overly optimistic assumption about future investment performance, and adopt a more realistic perspective on the future.
Provide teachers with comprehensive and understandable educational materials to make informed decisions about their retirement plans.
Allow new educators the ability to defer their enrollment in any retirement plan and have the employer contributions that would have been paid on their behalf put toward paying down student loans.
Texas TRS serves 1.6 million members, and it should work for every single one of those, instead of some. These changes are small, but significant steps that will ensure that’s the case in the future. Thank you for your time, and I look forward to receiving a response from you on this important matter.
Sincerely Yours,
[NAME]