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Level 1
posted Dec 3, 2019 7:32:15 AM

I am on social security and am self employed. A friend told me that I should be paying SS tax. I thought Turbo Tax would pick that up if it was true. Does TT do this?

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2 Replies
Level 15
Dec 3, 2019 7:36:21 AM

If you have a net profit from your self-employment income, then you will owe Self-Employment taxes.  SE taxes include both Social Security and Medicare taxes.  TurboTax calculates your SE taxes and the Schedule SE which is included with your personal tax return, Form 1040.

Level 15
Dec 3, 2019 8:45:24 AM

Self Employment tax (Scheduled SE) is automatically generated if a person has $400 or more of net profit from self-employment.  You pay 15.3% SE tax on 92.35% of your Net Profit greater than $400.  The 15.3% self employed SE Tax is to pay both the employer part and employee part of Social Security and Medicare.  So you get social security credit for it when you retire.  You do get to take off the 50% ER portion of the SE tax as an adjustment on 1040 Schedule 1 line 27.   The SE tax is already included in your tax due or reduced your refund.  It is on the 1040 Schedule 4 line 57 which goes to 1040 line 14. The SE tax is in addition to your regular income tax on the net profit. 

 

Then if you have enough income some of your Social Security Benefits might be taxable.  

 

Up to 85% of Social Security becomes taxable when all your other income plus 1/2 your social security, reaches:

Married Filing Jointly: $32,000

Single or head of household: $25,000

Married Filing Separately: 0