The number of state workers drawing their first pension checks in the first four months of this year is down nearly 8 percent from a year ago, according to the latest data from CalPERS.
The four-month retirement rate continues a trend set in 2011, when initial retirements for the calendar year fell 8 percent.
Last month, the number inaugural state retirees fell to 627, down 2.8 percent from April 2011.
CalPERS counts new retirement data from mid-month to mid-month. Owing to the rules that govern cost-of-living adjustments, more state workers retire at the end of the year than at any other time. Those retirements show up in the January figures.
By contrast, far fewer state workers elect to retire in February, March and April. Relatively small shifts in retirement patterns during those months can produce big swings in the year-over-year percentages.
A total 1,711 state and local government and school employees with a CalPERS pension headed for the exits in last month, up 11 percent from a year earlier. Since January, 9,776 CalPERS members have retired, down 6 percent compared with the same four-month period in 2011.
Click tabs at the bottom of the spreadsheet below to toggle between tables with retirement data for state worker and for all CalPERS members.
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