Do Social Security and Medicare Taxes Get Withheld From a Teen's Paycheck?
A teenager gets their first paycheck, expecting the full hourly total, and instead finds a handful of deductions labeled with abbreviations they’ve never seen before. It’s a common introduction to how payroll taxes work, and the confusion is understandable the first time around.
At a glance
Yes, in most cases. Social Security and Medicare taxes, together called FICA, are generally withheld from a teen’s paycheck the same way they are for any other employee, regardless of age. There’s a narrow, specific exception for a child under a certain age working directly for a parent’s sole proprietorship or certain family partnerships, but this doesn’t apply to most typical teen jobs at outside employers.
Why age generally doesn’t matter for FICA
FICA withholding is tied to the nature of the work and the employer, not the worker’s age. A teenager working part-time at a typical business is treated as an employee like anyone else for payroll tax purposes, meaning both the employee and employer portions of Social Security and Medicare taxes generally apply to those wages from the very first paycheck.
- No general age exemption. There isn’t a broad rule exempting minors from FICA simply because they’re young or working their first job.
- Applies regardless of total income. Even if a teen’s total yearly earnings are low enough that no income tax ends up owed, FICA withholding still typically applies to each paycheck, since it’s a separate system from income tax.
- Shows up as two line items. Pay stubs typically list Social Security and Medicare withholding separately, even though they’re often referred to together as FICA.
The narrow family-business exception
The main exception that does exist involves a child working directly for a parent’s unincorporated business, such as a sole proprietorship, and even then it typically only applies below a certain age and doesn’t extend to corporations or certain partnership structures. This exception is specific enough that it doesn’t cover the vast majority of teen jobs, including most retail, restaurant, or seasonal work at businesses the family doesn’t own.
How this differs from income tax withholding
It helps to separate two different systems that show up on the same pay stub. Income tax withholding is based on expected total yearly earnings and can sometimes be minimal or zero for a teen with low income, sometimes requiring a specific form adjustment to reflect that. FICA withholding, by contrast, is calculated as a flat percentage of each paycheck’s wages and doesn’t adjust based on total annual income the way federal income tax withholding does. This distinction is part of why two teens working similar hours can see very different total tax withholding depending on how each employer set up their income tax withholding elections, even though their FICA withholding looks proportionally the same.
What this means at tax filing time
Because FICA is separate from income tax, having FICA withheld doesn’t necessarily mean a teen owes income tax or needs to file a return, though filing requirements depend on total income and other factors. It’s a different question entirely from how overtime pay withholding can look different from actual tax owed, which deals with income tax brackets rather than FICA.
Other paycheck questions tend to come up around the same time for first-time or part-time workers, such as whether part-time employees usually get PTO payouts when they leave a job, or why a bonus combined into a regular paycheck can look different than expected. Both involve their own separate withholding quirks distinct from the FICA question above.
The bottom line
A smaller-than-expected first paycheck is usually a normal reflection of standard payroll tax withholding rather than an employer error. Understanding that FICA applies broadly regardless of age, with only a narrow family-business exception, can make that first pay stub a lot less confusing to read.