Code of Federal Regulations Title 20. Employees' Benefits § 20.404.1041 Wages

(a) The term wages means remuneration paid to you as an employee for employment unless specifically excluded. Wages are counted in determining your entitlement to retirement, survivors', and disability insurance benefits.

(b) If you are paid wages, it is not important what they are called. Salaries, fees, bonuses and commissions on sales or on insurance premiums are wages if they are remuneration paid for employment.

(c) The way in which you are paid is unimportant. Wages may be paid on the basis of piecework or a percentage of the profits. Wages may be paid on an hourly, daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly basis. (See § 404.1056 for special rules for agricultural labor.)

(d) Your wages can be in any form. You can be paid in cash or something other than cash, for example, in goods or clothing. (See paragraphs (e) and (f) of this section for kinds of employment where cash payments alone are considered wages and § 404.1043(b) concerning the value of meals and lodging as wages.) If your employer pays you cash for your meals and lodging on a regular basis as part of your employment, these payments may be considered wages. Payments other than cash may be counted as wages on the basis of the fair value of the items when paid.

(e) In certain kinds of employment, cash payments alone count as wages. These types of employment are agricultural labor, domestic services, and services not in the course of the employer's trade or business.

(f) To count as wages, payments for services performed by home workers who are employees as described in § 404.1008(d) must be in cash and must amount to $100 or more in a calendar year. Once this cash pay test is met, all remuneration paid, whether in cash or kind, is also wages.