I have all my work quarters in they say I became disabled in2019 i don't know how they came up with that but I was diagnosed with a lung disease well this yr I started getting ask or ssdi and they are only giving me 613.00 a month I made 3000 to 4000 a month working for the Colorado utilities now my question is if you have all your quarters in how do the calculate what you get a month I know I should be getting more then that

Hi. Social Security insured status is based on quarters of coverage (QC), but monthly benefit rates are based on a person's average annual earnings during the years on which their benefit rate is calculated. You can earn a QC this year with as little as $1470 in earnings, and if you earn at least $5880 you get 4 QCs. That's the same number of QCs you'd receive if you earned $142,800 this year.

So, the fact that you have enough QCs to qualify for Social Security disability (SSDI) benefits is irrelevant to your benefit calculation. SSDI benefits are based on an average of a variable number of years of earnings. The younger that a person is when they become disabled, the fewer the number of earnings years used. For example, if someone becomes disabled at age 24 their SSDI rate would be based on an average of their 2 highest years of Social Security covered earnings. But, if a person becomes disabled at age 62 then their benefit rate would be based on an average of their highest 35 years of earnings.

Basically, the higher a person's earnings average in the computational years used, the higher their SSDI rate. Sometimes zero earnings years must be used when a person didn't work steadily, and those zero years can lower a person's average earnings and resulting SSDI rate substantially. SSDI benefit calculations are too complex for an untrained person to compute from scratch, but if you believe that your benefit rate is too low you may want to consider filing an appeal (https://www.ssa.gov/pubs/EN-05-10058.pdf).

Best, Jerry