In Californicator land we have retired sheriffs and chief’s of police becoming city managers or asst to something.
Their retirement pay is often over 200K/year, and their new job pays over their retirement pay.
So you have guys in their 40’s or early 50’s getting an incredible retirement plus an incredible current salary.
Their health benefits are top drawer with minimal if any withholding for those benefits.
Don’t use too broad of a brush to paint with. I was the Public Works director at a small city in Washington State and I had my assistant water superintendent retire at age 50, because he could, under the PERS 1 pension system. Under that system his retirement was based off of the top 2 years of pay. At the time he retired he was making about $48,000 and with 30 years at 2%/year that would be $28,800/year. His medical to cover him and his wife was going to cost him at the time (pre-Obamacare) $1,500/month or $18,000. I tried to talk him out of it but he wanted to be an ass so away he went.
A year later he wanted to get his job back but I just laughed in his face. Lat I heard he was driving long haul trucks.
My point is Washington State’s pension system is not the gold plated one we hear about in California, NY, or Illinois. We do see a lot of retired California LEO and FF’s try to come up and take the open Chief’s jobs though so they can double dip.