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South Dakota

Overview

The South Dakota Retirement System is the sole statewide retirement system in the state, administering retirement benefits for employees of the state, public school teachers, and employees of political subdivisions that have elected to participate. SDRS assets are managed by the South Dakota Investment Council.

Plan Design

Defined benefit plans serve as the primary retirement benefit for substantially all public employees in South Dakota.

According to the US Government Accountability Office, 98 percent of employees of state and local government in South Dakota participate in Social Security.

Access plan design detail

Authorizing Statutes and Board Structure

Chapter 3 12-C.203 of South Dakota Codified Laws establishes the South Dakota Retirement System board, which is made up of 15 members.

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

South Dakota Codified Laws 4-5-27:
Any investments under the provisions of §§ 4-5-12 to 4-5-39, inclusive, shall be made with the exercise of that degree of judgment and care, under circumstances then prevailing, which persons of prudence, discretion, and intelligence exercise in the management of their own affairs, not for speculation but for investment, considering the probable safety of their capital as well as the probable income to be derived.
 

Legal Protections of Retirement Benefits

No explicit constitutional protection for public pension benefits, but courts provide protection based on the impairment of contract principles. Tait v. Freeman, 57 N.W.2d 520 (S.D. 1953) (recognizing that the state's statutory retirement system was contractual); 1980 S.E. Op. Atty. Gen. 209 (indicating that accrued benefits are protected from impairment); but see Buchholz v. Storsve, 740 N.W.2d 107 (S.D. 2007) (retroactive application Uniform Probate Code provision setting forth general rule that divorce automatically revokes an ex-spouse's beneficiary designation in a retirement plan did not violate state constitution's contract clause because amendment was not a severe restriction since it did not prevent participant from maintaining ex­ spouse as beneficiary, and even if it substantially impaired contractual relationship it served significant and legitimate public purposes). (SD CONST., Article 6, §12) 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 South Dakota (November 9, 1992)

Population (2025) 935,094

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

Assets

$16.1 billion

Active Members

44,351

Annuitants

35,933

Benefits Paid

$840.1 million

Employee Contributions

$180.5 million

Employer Contributions

$192.2 million

Systems

One state retirement system that accounts for 95 percent of assets and 99 percent of public retirement system participants in the state. The City of Sioux Falls maintains the sole local retirement system in South Dakota.

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.