§7447A Retirement for Special Trial Judges

Summary

Special trial judges may stop working and retire if they meet certain age-and-service rules: age 65 with 15 years; 66 with 14 years; 67 with 13 years; 68 with 12 years; 69 with 11 years; or 70 with 10 years. All time spent serving as a special trial judge counts, even if it was not continuous. A judge who becomes permanently unable to do the job must retire. To get retirement pay a judge must file a written choice with the chief judge while still serving (or within 60 days if not reappointed); that choice cannot be changed and the chief judge sends a copy to the Office of Personnel Management. If a retired judge elects retired pay, the amount is their years of service divided by 15, times the current judge’s salary, but not more than the full salary. A judge who retires for disability gets full salary if they had at least 10 years of service, or half that amount if they had fewer than 10 years. Pay starts the day after regular salary stops and continues for life. Parts of a year under 6 months are dropped; 6 months or more count as a full year. Time spent working on recall full-time counts as service. The chief judge may recall retirees to work, but without the judge’s agreement recalled work in any year cannot exceed 90 calendar days; recalled judges do not serve while ill, have the same legal authority, and receive the same pay and travel allowances instead of retired pay. Certain other rules for Tax Court judges apply, with references to the President treated as references to the chief judge.