How Your Supplemental Security Income Changes with Earnings

If you are working, continue to have a disability, have resources under $2,000 (for an individual), and are receiving Supplemental Security Income (SSI), the Social Security Administration (SSA) will allow you to continue to be eligible for SSI and will gradually reduce your SSI cash payment as your earnings increase. The amount of your adjusted SSI check will depend on your total countable income (which includes earned and unearned income). Whenever your earnings increase or decrease, your SSI payment will be adjusted.

How It Works

By applying some exclusions to your income and earnings, SSA will gradually reduce your SSI check as your earnings from work grow.

SSI recipients… who are working are still eligible to receive SSI if they continue have a disability and meet other requirements (such as income and resource limits). When working, the SSI payment will gradually decrease as earnings increase by approximately $1 for every $2 earned.

As SSA calculates your benefits, it will first deduct a $20 General Income Exclusion from your income or earnings and then deduct a $65 Earned Income Exclusion from your earnings. After applying these exclusions, they will then count half of the remainder of your earnings in calculating your new SSI payment. That’s beneficial to you, because it means SSA is counting less than half of your earnings when it calculates your monthly benefits. As a result, SSA won’t drastically reduce your benefits as you begin earning more.

In addition, there are other work incentives that may be applied to your individual situation and deducted from your earnings in calculating your new SSI payment.

Eventually, with increased earnings, you may reach something called the Break Even Point, when your total countable income reduces your SSI payment to zero. Keep in mind, though, when SSI recipients with disabilities work, they usually find that they have more money available because of the countable income formula.


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