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Nevada

Overview

The Nevada Public Employees Retirement System (NVPERS) is the sole state retirement system in Nevada, administering retirement and other benefits for employees of the state, public school teachers, and employees of political subdivisions that have elected to participate.

Plan Design

Substantially all employees of the State of Nevada and its political subdivisions participate in a traditional defined benefit plan as their primary retirement benefit.

According to the US Government Accountability Office, 4 percent of employees of state and local government in Nevada participate in Social Security.

Access plan design detail

Authorizing Statutes and Board Structure

Nevada Revised Statutes Chapter 286 establishes the Nevada PERS and its board, composition, duties, and responsibilities, including oversight of assets. 

Details regarding the composition of these and other retirement boards is accessible via the Retirement and Investment Board Characteristics search tool located at the bottom of this page.  

Fiduciary Duty/Prudence Standard

Prudent Person Standard

The Board may invest the money in its funds in every kind of investment which persons of prudence, discretion and intelligence acquire or retain for their own account.

Legal Protections of Retirement Benefits

No explicit constitutional protection for public pension benefits, but courts provide protection based on the impairment of contract principles. The Nevada courts distinguish between "limited" and "absolute" vesting rights. When all retirement conditions are satisfied, retirement benefits are deemed to ripen into a full contractual obligation. Nicholas v. State, 992 P.2d 262 (Nev. 2000) (recognizing that pension rights become absolutely vested upon retirement at which time pension benefits are constitutionally protected against impairment); Pub. Emps.' Ret. Bd. v. Washoe County., 96 Nev. 718, 615 P.2d 972, 974 (Nev. 1980) (concluding that, in "rendering services and making contributions, an employee acquires a limited vested right to pension benefits"). (NV CONST., Article 1, §15) Source: Robert Klausner, Esq., State Constitutional Protections for Public Sector Retirement Benefits

See also the following search tools:

Retirement System Account Interest Policies Economic Actuarial Assumptions Retirement and Investment Board Characteristics
Information about interest rates applied to account balances of inactive plan participants Assumed rates of investment return and inflation Composition and characteristics of public retirement and investment oversight boards
Mortality Assumptions Plan Design Features Post-retirement Employment Policies
Public retirement system actuarial assumptions for mortality Numerous elements of retirement plan design Policies governing return-to-work for retirement system annuitants

More Data

Flag of Nevada (July 25, 1991)

Population (2025) 3,282,188

Nevada public pension statistics, per U.S. Census Bureau as of FY 2025

Assets

$71.6 billion

Active Members

121,722

Annuitants

87,671

Benefits Paid

$4.1 billion

Employee Contributions

$1.7 billion

Employer Contributions

$1.7 billion

Systems

One state retirement system; there are no retirement systems in Nevada sponsored by local government.

Other Resources


Become A Member

Becoming a member of NASRA offers a unique opportunity to join a community committed to the sound, efficient, and innovative stewardship of public retirement systems. Membership connects you with a network of professionals and experts, providing valuable insights into managing public retirement systems with a focus on sustainability and risk-averse strategies.

By joining NASRA, you gain the tools and resources to enhance the management of public retirement systems, ensuring their long-term success and reliability for generations to come.

What's New at NASRA: Government Spending Issue Brief

NASRA’s March 2026 update on government spending makes a basic but important point: public pension benefits are not paid out of a government’s day-to-day operating budget. They are paid from trust funds that employees and employers contribute to during an employee’s working years. Those trusts distribute more than $400 billion each year to retirees and beneficiaries in communities across the country. On a national basis, employer contributions to pension trusts in FY 2023 equaled 5.16 percent of direct general spending by state and local governments, which shows that pension contributions remain a limited share of overall public spending even though the level varies from one state to another. 
The brief also shows that pension costs should be viewed in the context of the changes governments have made over the past 15 years to strengthen plan funding. Following the 2008–09 market decline, nearly every state and many local governments adjusted contributions, benefits, or both to improve pension sustainability. More recent data show that employer contributions increased from FY 2022 to FY 2023, but pension spending as a share of total government spending remained broadly stable. The updated brief provides FY 2023 figures and also projects the aggregate pension spending rate for FY 2024, offering a useful snapshot of both current costs and the longer funding trend.