Pension Plan

Super rad-- it's great to have one of these in this day and age.

As a postdoc pension plan is not offered as a benefit at MIT. I'm not sure how it works there for other type of employees (i.e. administrative staff).

Strong pension plan which vests after three years

Yes, the pension plan is good and it will vary with each department. More information can be inquired from the individual employer.

If you retire with MIT with 10 years of employment at age 55 or above, you can also have a pension plan in addition to 401K benefits.

The fact that they have a pension plan at all is enough to get 5 stars

MIT has a separate pension plan that vests after three years of service. A nice bonus to the regular 401K.

This is available to any employee working full-time, and activates 1 year after official hire date. Pensions are basically unheard of outside of government and rail jobs, so this was quite a surprise. MIT pays into this plan, without the employee paying into it, so it's basically free money. This is much appreciated, especially with the uncertainty of the future of Social Security, and the fact that you don't need to rely solely on your 401k or a Roth IRA for retirement.

This is available to any employee working full-time, and activates 1 year after official hire date. Pensions are basically unheard of outside of government and rail jobs, so this was quite a surprise. MIT pays into this plan, without the employee paying into it, so it's basically free money. This is much appreciated, especially with the uncertainty of the future of Social Security, and the fact that you don't need to rely solely on your 401k or a Roth IRA for retirement.