§ 404.1096 - Self-employment income.

§ 404.1096 Self-employment income.

(a) General. Self-employment income is the amount of your net earnings from self-employment that is subject to social security tax and counted for social security benefit purposes. The term self-employment income means the net earnings from self-employment you derive in a taxable year, except as described in paragraphs (b), (c) and (d) of this section.

(b) Maximum self-employment income.

(1) The term self-employment income does not include that part of your net earnings from self-employment that exceeds (or that part of your net earnings from self-employment which, when added to the wages you received in that taxable year, exceeds) -

Taxable year	Amount
Ending before 1955	$3,600
Ending in 1955 through 1958	4,200
Ending in 1959 through 1965	4,800
Ending in 1966 and 1967	6,600
Ending after 1967 and beginning before 1972	7,800
Beginning in 1972	9,000
Beginning in 1973	10,800
Beginning in 1974	13,200
Beginning in 1975	14,100
Beginning in 1976	15,300
Beginning in 1977	16,500
Beginning in 1978	17,700
Beginning in 1979	22,900
Beginning in 1980	25,900
Beginning in 1981	29,700
Beginning in 1982	32,400
Beginning in 1983	35,700
Beginning in 1984	37,800
Beginning in 1985	39,600
Beginning in 1986	42,000
Beginning in 1987	43,800
Beginning in 1988	45,000
Beginning in 1989	48,000
Beginning in 1990	51,300
Beginning in 1991	53,400
Beginning in 1992	55,500

(2) For the purpose of this paragraph the term wages includes remuneration paid to an employee for services covered by an agreement entered into under section 218 of the Act, or an agreement entered into under section 3121(l) of the Code, which would be wages under section 209 of Act if the services were considered employment under section 210(a) of the Act.

(c) Minimum net earnings from self employment.

(1) Self-employment income does not include your net earnings from self-employment when the amount of those earnings for the taxable year is less than $400. If you have only $300 of net earnings from self-employment for the taxable year you would not have any self-employment income. (Special rules apply if you are paid $100 or more and work for a church or church-controlled organization that has exempted its employees (see § 404.1068(f)).)

(2) If you have net earnings from self-employment of $400 or more for the taxable year you may have less than $400 of creditable self-employment income. This occurs where your net earnings from self-employment is $400 or more for a taxable year and the amount of your net earnings from self-employment plus the amount of the wages paid to you during that taxable year exceed the maximum creditable earnings for a year. For example, if you had net earnings from self-employment of $1,000 for 1978, and were also paid wages of $17,500 during 1978, your creditable self-employment income for 1978 would be $200.

(d) Nonresident aliens. A nonresident alien has self-employment income only if coverage is provided under a totalization agreement [see § 404.1913]. We do not consider an individual who is a resident of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, Guam, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, or American Samoa to be a nonresident alien.

[45 FR 20075, Mar. 27, 1980, as amended at 50 FR 36575, Sept. 9, 1985; 52 FR 8250, Mar. 17, 1987; 57 FR 44098, Sept. 24, 1992; 69 FR 51556, Aug. 20, 2004]