The OP needs to research this. You are only allowed up to 80 hours a month, and earn less than about $1180 a month. Now, there is more to this. You can make an unlimited amount of money for the first nine months. Then the clock starts ticking. Every time you earn above $1180 a month, you do not get your benefits for that month. Otherwise, you will get your benefits. After three years, whether you have been working or not, then you enter another phase. I forget what this is called, but it allows for rapid reinstatement of your benefits without you going through the whole application process again.

Now if you make something like $840 or less, none of this will happen. So you need to decide if it is worthwhile to keep earning $1180 a month and forego your period of unlimited earnings, and the running down of the clock over the following three year period. However, for people who know they will never work more than 80 hours a month and never make more than $1180 a month, and instead just stay on disability the rest of their lives, then all of this may not be an issue to them.

I have seen that even if SSDI thinks that you can make over $1180, they can remove you from disability. What I am saying is that you have to know what you are doing. You are taking risks if you do not. You do not want to inadvertently prove to them that you are capable of earning more than $1180 a month or more. This would be foolishness. For example, if you were to go to back to college, you can lose your benefits. They think that if you can hold down a college curriculum, you are ready to be taken off of disability. I have seen one person that earned over $1180 for just one month, and did this by accident. It was some work with her benefits specialist to resolve this problem. SSDI can be sticklers for this type of thing.

I would urge a person to see a SSDI lawyer brefore considering to work part time. This is what I did. It was the best $150 that I have spent concerning this issue. Now for the most part, I understand the issues involved with SSDI and working P/T as it applies to me. Please do not take my word for anything. Only believe what your lawyer tell you.

Here are some examples. Do you know that if you make allot of money through investments, perhaps dividends from stock, you get to keep your disability? This is even the case when this income well exceeds over $1180 a month. When I liquidated my bonds, I made $20,000 in profit. No problems from SSDI. This is considered unearned income. SSDI is interested in tracking only earned income.

I was thinking of renting a room to my mother. Relax, this is to get around a technicality in the law. The amount I would charge would be considered unearned income. I would be doing no additional work to get this income. Now what happrens if I do the laundry for her and myself? How about clean up the house? Including her room? I read that the court ruled the monthly rent would still not be considered earned income. The laundry and cleaning would happen even if my mother was not there. My friend is thinking of giving me over $20,000 a year on a monthly basis. It is an arrangement that we may have. This will not affect my disability since it can be considered unearned income. I will be doing nothing for him. (I did try to convince him that he should put me to work)

Why am I saying all of this? I am showing you that SSDI law is not necessarily a simple thing to understand

PS I have learned from a visit to SS office that SSDI is more interested in the hours work than the amount earned. However, I suspect this would be at their discretion. Also, there is an official guide called the “Red Book”. You can google for it. You will find there the rules about this topic which SS follows.