Say you receive Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) and you pick up a part-time job paying $1,700 a month. This year, that paycheck would put you over the limit the Social Security Administration (SSA) uses to decide whether you are working too much to keep your benefits. Starting in January, it won’t.<\/p>\n
The SSA has published its 2027 figures, and three thresholds for people who work while on disability are going up. If you have ever lost SSDI after going back to work<\/a>, these are the numbers that decide it. We explain what each one means and how they fit together.<\/p>\n According to the SSA’s 2027 fact sheet<\/a>, the monthly amounts change as follows:<\/p>\n The increases are tied to national wage growth, so they are separate from the 3.6% cost-of-living adjustment (COLA). That raise applies to the benefit itself: the SSA estimates the average disabled worker will go from $1,642 to $1,701 a month in January.<\/p>\n Think of it as a test run. During a Trial Work Period, you can earn any amount and keep your full SSDI check, no matter how much you make.<\/p>\n The SSA counts a month as a trial month when your earnings go above the threshold, which will be $1,270 next year. You get nine trial months, and they don’t have to be in a row, but they must fall within a rolling period of 60 months, or five years.<\/p>\n Once the trial months are used up, the SGA limit takes over. The agency then looks at whether your monthly earnings are above $1,770, or $2,950 if you are blind.<\/p>\nThese are the new limits for 2027<\/h2>\n
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What is the Trial Work Period?<\/h2>\n
What happens after those nine months?<\/h2>\n