Factors that may, or may not, affect your retirement benefits include:

• Getting Benefits While Working
You can work while you receive Social Security retirement (or survivors) benefits. When you do, it could mean a higher benefit for you in the future. Higher benefits can be important to you later in life and increase the future benefit amounts your family and your survivors could receive.

Note: If you are outside the United States, the rules for receiving benefits while you are working are different.

While you are working, your earnings will reduce your benefit amount only until you reach your full retirement age. After you reach full retirement age, we recalculate your benefit amount to leave out the months when we reduced or withheld benefits due to your excess earnings.

Note: If your earnings for the year are higher than one of the years we originally used to compute your retirement benefit, we will substitute the new year of earnings.

We use a formula to determine how much your benefit must be reduced:
If you are under full retirement age for the entire year, we deduct $1 from your benefit payments for every $2 you earn above the annual limit.
For 2013, that limit is $15,120.

In the year you reach full retirement age, we deduct $1 in benefits for every $3 you earn above a different limit, but we only count earnings before the month you reach your full retirement age.

If you will reach full retirement age in 2013, the limit on your earnings for the months before full retirement age is $40,080. (If you were born in 1947 or 1948, your full retirement age is 66 years.)

Starting with the month you reach full retirement age, you can get your benefits with no limit on your earnings.

Caution: If you apply for benefits more than 6 months after you reach full retirement age, we can only pay the benefits for the previous 6 months.

Note: If your earnings will be over the limit but you will be retired for part of the year, we have a special rule that applies to earnings for one year.

The special rule means we cannot deduct excess earnings from any whole month we consider you retired, regardless of your yearly earnings.

If you are not already receiving benefits, be sure to contact us at the beginning of the year you reach full retirement age. Even if you are still working, you may be able to receive some or all of your benefits for the months before you reach full retirement age.

• Different kinds of earnings:
o Farm Work
o Federal Government Employment
o Household Employment

If you are a household worker--for example, a cleaning person, cook, gardener, or baby sitter--and you earn $1,800 or more in cash wages during 2012 from one employer, that employer must deduct Social Security and Medicare taxes from your wages. The employer will report your earnings to Social Security after the end of the year.

If you earn less than $1,800 in 2013 from that employer, the earnings are not covered and will not be reported.

Earnings for household workers (such as baby sitters) who are under age 18 are exempt from Social Security and Medicare taxes unless household work is the young person's primary occupation.

o Military Service
o Nonprofit Or Religious Organizations
o Railroad Earnings
o Self-Employment

You are self-employed if you operate a trade, business or profession, either by yourself or as a partner.

You report your earnings for Social Security when you file your federal income tax return.

If your net earnings are $400 or more in any year, you must report your earnings on Schedule SE for Social Security purposes, in addition to the other tax forms you must file.

You pay your Social Security and Medicare taxes along with your income tax.

o State And Local Government Employment
o Wages

When you work as an employee, your wages are generally covered by Social Security and by Medicare.

Your employer reports your earnings to Social Security at the same time he gives you your W-2 form for filing your income tax return. In fact, his "report" is a copy of that W-2 form.

Because of the more than 250 million wage reports we must record, your earnings for last year may not show up on your record until late in the current year.

We process earnings by employer reports, not by individual persons.

If you worked for more than one employer during the year, we won't be posting your total earnings for the year all at one time. Your earnings from each employer will be added to your record when we process that employer's report.

o Work Outside The United States
 If you are among the growing number of Americans who spend part of their career working outside the U.S., you may wonder what effect this will have on your Social Security taxes and benefits. Fortunately, the United States has concluded Social Security agreements with a number of other countries that help you avoid double taxation while working abroad and also help protect your future benefit rights.

Your work overseas may help you to qualify for U.S. benefits if it was covered under a foreign Social Security system.

One of the main purposes of the international agreements is to help people who have worked in both the United States and the other country, but who have not worked long enough in one country or the other to qualify for Social Security benefits. Under the agreement, we can count your work credits in the other country if this will help you qualify for U.S. benefits. However, if you already have enough credit under U.S. Social Security to qualify for a benefit, we will not count your credits in the other country.

If we have to count your foreign work credits, you will receive a partial U.S. benefit that is related to the length of time you worked under U.S. Social Security.

Although we may count your work credits in the other country, your credits are not actually transferred from that country to the United States. They remain on your record in the other country. It is therefore possible for you to qualify for a separate benefit payment from both countries.
• Government Pension Offset (GPO)
• Income Tax And Your Social Security Benefits

Some people have to pay federal income taxes on their Social Security benefits. This usually happens only if you have other substantial income (such as wages, self-employment, interest, dividends and other taxable income that must be reported on your tax return) in addition to your benefits.
No one pays federal income tax on more than 85 percent of his or her Social Security benefits based on Internal Revenue Service (IRS) rules. If you:
1.file a federal tax return as an "individual" and your combined income* is
(1)between $25,000 and $34,000, you may have to pay income tax on up to 50 percent of your benefits.
(2)more than $34,000, up to 85 percent of your benefits may be taxable.

2.file a joint return, and you and your spouse have a combined income* that is
(1)between $32,000 and $44,000, you may have to pay income tax on up to 50 percent of your benefits
(2)more than $44,000, up to 85 percent of your benefits may be taxable.
(3)are married and file a separate tax return, you probably will pay taxes on your benefits.

*Note:
Your adjusted gross income+ Nontaxable interest+ ½ of your Social Security benefits= Your "combined income"

Each January you will receive a Social Security Benefit Statement (Form SSA-1099) showing the amount of benefits you received in the previous year. You can use this Benefit Statement when you complete your federal income tax return to find out if your benefits are subject to tax.

If you do have to pay taxes on your Social Security benefits, you can make quarterly estimated tax payments to the IRS or choose to have federal taxes withheld from your benefits.

• Maximum TaxableEarnings
There is a maximum amount of earnings (wages and net profit from self-employment) on which you pay Social Security taxes each year.

For 2013, the maximum amount of taxable earnings is $113,700.

• Pension, Annuities, Interest And Dividends
• Social Security Credits
• Windfall Elimination Provision (WEP)