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TAX YEAR
2019
Household Employees
Household Employees child care services in his or her home generally is not a
household employee.
If you have a household employee, you may need to
withhold and pay Social Security and Medicare taxes A worker hired through an agency is not an employee
(FICA), pay federal unemployment tax (FUTA), or both. if the agency is responsible for who does the work and
how it is done.
Workers Who Are Household Employees
A household employee is an employee hired to perform Household Employment Taxes
work in or around your home. The worker is an employ-
ee if you can control both what and how work is done. Taxpayers with household employees must file Sched-
It does not matter whether the work is full time or part ule H (Form 1040), Household Employment Taxes, to report
time or that the worker was hired through an agency or FICA tax, FUTA tax, and federal income tax withholding
association. It also does not matter whether the worker (if any).
is paid on an hourly, daily, or weekly basis, or by the job. Form W-2 must be filed for each household employ-
Note: If the worker usually provides his or her own ee who was paid Social Security or Medicare wages of
work tools and offers services to the general public, he $2,100 (2019) or more, or wages of any amount if federal
or she is an independent contractor and not a house- income tax was withheld.
hold employee. Taxpayers who are required to file Schedule H (Form
1040) with their 2019 individual tax returns must obtain
Household Workers an Employer Identification Number (EIN) by January
Some examples of workers who do household work 31, 2020.
include the following.
• Babysitters age 18 or older. • Housekeepers. FICA
• Caretakers. • Maids. The Social Security tax pays for old-age, survivors, and
• Domestic workers. • Nannies. disability benefits for workers and their families. The
• Drivers. • Private nurses. Medicare tax pays for hospital insurance. Both the em-
• Health aides. • Yard workers. ployer and the household employee may owe Social Se-
• House cleaning workers. curity and Medicare taxes. For 2019, the employer and
employee share is 7.65% (6.2% for Social Security tax
Workers Who Are Not Household Employees and 1.45% for Medicare tax) of the employee’s FICA
If only the worker can control how the work is done, wages. The employer is responsible for remitting both
the worker is not a household employee but is self-em- the employee’s and employer’s share of the taxes. Typi-
ployed. A self-employed worker usually provides his or cally, the employee’s share is withheld from the employ-
her own tools and offers services to the general pub- ee’s wages and submitted with the employer’s payment.
lic as an independent business. A worker who performs
