Thrift Savings Plan

The Thrift Savings Plan (TSP) is a defined contribution plan for United States civil service employees and retirees as well as for members of the uniformed services. As of December 31 2015, there were approximately 4.8 million participants, and nearly $458 billion in assets under management.

The TSP is one of three components of the Federal Employees Retirement System (FERS; the others being the FERS annuity and Social Security) and is designed to closely resemble the dynamics of both private sector 401(k) and Roth 401k (new Roth TSP implemented in May 2012) plans. It is also open to employees covered under the older Civil Service Retirement System (CSRS).

The TSP is administered by the Federal Retirement Thrift Investment Board.

FERS employees are eligible to join TSP immediately upon starting work and may join at any time thereafter. Prior to June 22, 2009, new employees had to wait at least one year before receiving matching contributions (including Agency Automatic Contributions); after this date employees were eligible for automatic contributions from day one of employment, and are immediately eligible for matching contributions once the employee begins contributing to the TSP.

CSRS employees and members of the uniformed services may join at any time.

All FERS and CSRS employees and members of the uniformed services may contribute up to the Internal Revenue Code limitation, which is $18,000 for 2017. The contribution for FERS and CSRS may be either a specific dollar amount per paycheck or a percentage of income (but the percentage must be a whole percentage; fractional percentages are not allowed), uniformed service members elect a percentage of pay only. (Prior to 2006 the contribution was limited to a specified whole percentage of pay.) Once the contribution is selected it automatically renews each year at the same amount or percentage until the participant elects otherwise. As of September 2015, new employees will be enrolled in the TSP with a 3% deduction from their gross pay being deposited into the age-appropriate Lifecycle Fund unless they make another choice.

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