pension
Americannoun
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pensions
plural
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a fixed amount, other than wages, paid at regular intervals to a person or to the person's surviving dependents in consideration of past services, age, merit, poverty, injury or loss sustained, etc..
a retirement pension.
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an allowance, annuity, or subsidy.
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(in France and elsewhere in continental Europe)
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a boardinghouse or small hotel.
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room and board.
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verb (used with object)
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pensions,
present (3rd person singular)
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pensioned,
past participle, past
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pensioning
present participle
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to grant or pay a pension to.
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to cause to retire on a pension (usually followed byoff ).
noun
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a relatively cheap boarding house
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another name for full board
noun
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a regular payment made by the state to people over a certain age to enable them to subsist without having to work
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a regular payment made by an employer to former employees after they retire
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a regular payment made to a retired person as the result of his or her contributions to a personal pension scheme
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any regular payment made on charitable grounds, by way of patronage, or in recognition of merit, service, etc
a pension paid to a disabled soldier
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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nonpensionableadjective
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pensionableadjective
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pensionlessadjective
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unpensionableadjective
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unpensionedadjective
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unpensioningadjective
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well-pensionedadjective
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pensionablyadverb
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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pensionsimple
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pensionssimple
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have pensionedperfect
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has pensionedperfect
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am pensioningprogressive
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are pensioningprogressive
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is pensioningprogressive
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have been pensioningperfect progressive
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has been pensioningperfect progressive
Past
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pensionedsimple
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had pensionedperfect
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was pensioningprogressive
-
were pensioningprogressive
-
had been pensioningperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of pension
First recorded in 1325–75; Middle English, from Old French pensïon, from Latin pēnsiōn-, stem of pēnsiō “measured weight,” hence, “payment, rent,” from pēns(us) “weighed” (past participle of pendere “to hang, weigh out, pay by weight”) + -iō -ion
Explanation
A pension is a regular payment, usually from a company you worked for, that allows you to survive without working after you retire. In used to be common for someone to spend their entire career at one company, and then retire at 65 and receive a pension: regular payments of enough money to live on in old age. Nowadays, not that many jobs offer pensions, and it's hard for companies that do to pay for them, which is why you're likely to hear this word when people are arguing about budget cuts. It's also a verb: if you pension your employee, you give them a pension. How nice of you!
Vocabulary lists containing pension
The Boy in the Striped Pajamas
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This Week in Words: February 16 - 22, 2019
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The Great Depression and The New Deal
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
I had about $250,000 of my own in cash and stocks, in addition to my Social Security and a small private pension, and I could rent, but I couldn’t buy a $1 million house.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 20, 2026
Rob Wassell, 58, has been waiting almost two years for the lump sum from his brother's civil service pension, following his death.
From BBC ● Oct. 19, 2026
A 10-year Treasury yielding more than 5% starts looking awfully attractive to retirees, pension funds, insurers, foreign institutions and anyone else searching for dependable income.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 16, 2026
The supervisor of New York City’s pension funds, one of the largest in the United States, asked Anthropic to postpone its stock market debut until risks posed by its artificial intelligence technology are better controlled.
From Barron's ● Oct. 15, 2026
She was close to retirement anyway, so she left the family and Charles provided her with an annual pension for the rest of her life.
From "Charles and Emma: The Darwins' Leap of Faith" by Deborah Heiligman
The Civil Service Pension scheme manages the pensions of 1.7 million public sector workers in the UK.
From BBC ● Oct. 19, 2026
Nearly a third of the education ministry's budget for 2027 is to go towards pensions, according to a government report on the draft plan.
From Barron's ● Oct. 16, 2026
In Finland, depression is the leading individual cause of both extended sick leave and disability pensions.
From Science Daily ● Oct. 9, 2026
His parents, both 80 and in excellent health, own their home outright and have about $600,000 in a brokerage account, in addition to pensions and Social Security.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 6, 2026
“They get holidays, don’t they? And — and sick leave, and pensions, and everything?”
From "Harry Potter And The Goblet Of Fire" by J. K. Rowling
It is the reason why James Anderson was pensioned off in 2024.
From BBC ● Nov. 21, 2025
The family is now composed of the same sort of banal attention-seekers and time-servers as the rest of Europe’s pensioned aristocracy, which includes Facebook-addled coup plotters and Epstein island guests of honor.
From Slate ● Apr. 21, 2023
The airline struggled with a 51-day pilots' strike between September and November 2017, grounding half its fleet and resulting in dozens of pilots being fired, while others resigned or were pensioned off.
From Reuters ● Nov. 25, 2021
A horse is pensioned when it is no longer available for breeding.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 16, 2020
“Not that it need come to that,” Mr. Owen blurted, meaning Tansy might marry and be saved before she was pensioned off.
From "The Teacher’s Funeral" by Richard Peck
Downpour and Inferno are states that people drive between pensioning their senators and whitegoods.
From New York Times ● Apr. 15, 2022
If that meant that the company was pensioning him off, Mr. Pratt must have had his tongue in his cheek.
From Time Magazine Archive
No European nation thinks of pensioning an ex-soldier simply because he was drafted to fight for his country.
From Time Magazine Archive
The period-of-presumption idea was done away with entirely, the Government pensioning War veterans frankly on their civil disability.
From Time Magazine Archive
"I hesitate to suggest pensioning off a faithful servant, but you really ought to have a better watchdog."
From Secret Adversary by Agatha Christie
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Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
