"Employment" shall not include the following:
(1) Except as provided in section 2(i) of this chapter, service
performed prior to January 1, 1978, in the employ of this state,
any other state, any town or city, or political subdivision, or any
instrumentality of any of them, other than service performed in
the employ of a municipally owned public utility as defined in this
article; or service performed in the employ of the United States of
America, or an instrumentality of the United States immune under
the Constitution of the United States from the contributions
imposed by this article, except that to the extent that the Congress
of the United States shall permit states to require any
instrumentalities of the United States to make payments into an
unemployment fund under a state unemployment compensation
statute, all of the provisions of this article shall be applicable to
such instrumentalities, in the same manner, to the same extent,
and on the same terms as to all other employers, employing units,
individuals, and services. However, if this state shall not be
certified for any year by the Secretary of Labor under Section
3304 of the Internal Revenue Code the payments required of such
instrumentalities with respect to that year shall be refunded by the
commissioner from the fund in the same manner and within the
same period as is provided in IC 22-4-32-19 with respect to
contribution erroneously paid or wrongfully assessed.
(2) Service with respect to which unemployment compensation is
payable under an unemployment compensation system
established by an Act of Congress; however, the department is
authorized to enter into agreements with the proper agencies
under the Act of Congress which agreements shall become
effective ten (10) days after publication, in accordance with rules
adopted by the department under IC 4-22-2, to provide reciprocal
treatment to individuals who have, after acquiring potential rights
to benefits under this article, acquired rights to unemployment
compensation under the Act of Congress, or who have, after
having acquired potential rights to unemployment compensation
under the Act of Congress, acquired rights to benefits under this
article.
(3) "Agricultural labor" as provided in section 2(l)(1) of this
chapter shall include only services performed:
(A) on a farm, in the employ of any person, in connection with
cultivating the soil or in connection with raising or harvesting
any agricultural or horticultural commodity, including the
raising, shearing, feeding, caring for, training, and management
of livestock, bees, poultry, and furbearing animals and wildlife;
(B) in the employ of the owner or tenant or other operator of a
farm, in connection with the operation, management,
conservation, improvement, or maintenance of a farm and its
tools and equipment, or in salvaging timber or clearing land of
brush and other debris left by a hurricane, if the major part of
the service is performed on a farm;
(C) in connection with the production or harvesting of any
commodity defined as an agricultural commodity in Section
15(g) of the Agricultural Marketing Act (12 U.S.C. 1141j(g))
as amended, or in connection with the operation or maintenance
of ditches, canals, reservoirs, or waterways, not owned or
operated for profit, used exclusively for supplying and storing
water for farming purposes;
(D) in the employ of:
(i) the operator of a farm in handling, planting, drying,
packing, packaging, processing, freezing, grading, storing, or
delivering to storage or to market or to a carrier for
transportation to market, in its unmanufactured state, any
agricultural or horticultural commodity; but only if the
operator produced more than one-half (1/2) of the commodity
with respect to which the service is performed; or
(ii) a group of operators of farms (or a cooperative
organization of which such operators are members) in the
performance of service described in item (i), but only if the
operators produce more than one-half (1/2) of the commodity
with respect to which the service is performed;
except the provisions of items (i) and (ii) shall not be deemed
to be applicable with respect to service performed in connection
with commercial canning or commercial freezing or in
connection with any agricultural or horticultural commodity
after its delivery to a terminal market for distribution for
consumption; or
(E) on a farm operated for profit if the service is not in the
course of the employer's trade or business or is domestic service
in a private home of the employer.
(4) As used in subdivision (3), "farm" includes stock, dairy,
poultry, fruit, furbearing animals, and truck farms, nurseries,
orchards, greenhouses, or other similar structures used primarily
for the raising of agricultural or horticultural commodities.
(5) Domestic service in a private home, local college club, or
local chapter of a college fraternity or sorority, except as provided
in section 2(m) of this chapter.
(6) Service performed on or in connection with a vessel or aircraft
not an American vessel or American aircraft, if the employee is
employed on and in connection with the vessel or aircraft when
outside the United States.
(7) Service performed by an individual in the employ of child or
spouse, and service performed by a child under the age of
twenty-one (21) in the employ of a parent.
(8) Service not in the course of the employing unit's trade or
business performed in any calendar quarter by an individual,
unless the cash remuneration paid for the service is fifty dollars
($50) or more and the service is performed by an individual who
is regularly employed by the employing unit to perform the
service. For the purposes of this subdivision, an individual shall
be deemed to be regularly employed to perform service not in the
course of an employing unit's trade or business during a calendar
quarter only if:
(A) on each of some of twenty-four (24) days during the quarter
that the individual performs the service for some portion of the
day; or
(B) the individual was regularly employed (as determined under
clause (A)) by an employing unit in the performance of a
service during the preceding calendar quarter.
(9) Service performed by an individual in any calendar quarter in
the employ of any organization exempt from income tax under
Section 501 of the Internal Revenue Code (except those services
included in sections 2(i) and 2(j) of this chapter) if the
remuneration for the service is less than fifty dollars ($50).
(10) Service performed in the employ of a hospital, if the service
is performed by a patient of the hospital.
(11) Service performed in the employ of a school or eligible
postsecondary educational institution if the service is performed:
(A) by a student who is enrolled and is regularly attending
classes at the school or eligible postsecondary educational
institution; or
(B) by the spouse of a student, if the spouse is advised, at the
time the spouse commences to perform the service, that:
(i) the employment of the spouse to perform the service is
provided under a program to provide financial assistance to
the student by the school or eligible postsecondary
educational institution; and
(ii) the employment will not be covered by any program of
unemployment insurance.
(12) Service performed by an individual who is enrolled at a
nonprofit or public educational institution which normally
maintains a regular faculty and curriculum and normally has a
regularly organized body of students in attendance at the place
where its educational activities are carried on as a student in a
full-time program, taken for credit at the institution, which
combines academic instruction with work experience, if the
service is an integral part of the program, and the institution has
so certified to the employer, except that this subdivision shall not
apply to service performed in a program established for or on
behalf of an employer or group of employers.
(13) Service performed in the employ of a government foreign to
the United States of America, including service as a consular or
other officer or employee or a nondiplomatic representative.
(14) Service performed in the employ of an instrumentality
wholly owned by a government foreign to that of the United
States of America, if the service is of a character similar to that
performed in foreign countries by employees of the United States
of America or of an instrumentality of the United States of
America, and if the department finds that the Secretary of State of
the United States has certified to the Secretary of the Treasury of
the United States that the government, foreign to the United
States, with respect to whose instrumentality exemption is
claimed, grants an equivalent exemption with respect to similar
service performed in such country by employees of the United
States and of instrumentalities of the United States.
(15) Service performed as a student nurse in the employ of a
hospital or nurses' training school by an individual who is
enrolled and is regularly attending classes in a nurses' training
school chartered or approved pursuant to state law; and service
performed as an intern in the employ of a hospital by an
individual who has completed a four (4) year course in a medical
school chartered or approved pursuant to state law.
(16) Service performed by an individual as an insurance producer
or as an insurance solicitor, if all service performed by the
individual is performed for remuneration solely by way of
commission.
(17) Service performed by an individual:
(A) under the age of eighteen (18) in the delivery or distribution
of newspapers or shopping news, not including delivery or
distribution to any point for subsequent delivery or distribution;
or
(B) in, and at the time of, the sale of newspapers or magazines
to ultimate consumers, under an arrangement under which the
newspapers or magazines are to be sold by the individual at a
fixed price, the individual's compensation being based on the
retention of the excess of the price over the amount at which the
newspapers or magazines are charged to the individual, whether
or not the individual is guaranteed a minimum amount of
compensation for the service, or is entitled to be credited with
the unsold newspapers or magazines turned back.
(18) Service performed in the employ of an international
organization to the extent the services are excluded from
employment under 26 CFR 31.3306(c)(16).
(19) Except as provided in IC 22-4-7-1, services covered by an
election duly approved by the agency charged with the
administration of any other state or federal unemployment
compensation law in accordance with an arrangement pursuant to
IC 22-4-22-1 through IC 22-4-22-5, during the effective period of
such election.
(20) If the service performed during one-half (1/2) or more of any
pay period by an individual for an employing unit constitutes
employment, all the services of the individual for the period shall
be deemed to be employment; but if the services performed
during more than one-half (1/2) of any pay period by an
individual do not constitute employment, then none of the
services of the individual for the period shall be deemed to be
employment. As used in this subdivision, "pay period" means a
period of not more than thirty-one (31) consecutive days for
which a payment of remuneration is ordinarily made to the
individual by the employing unit. This subdivision shall not be
applicable with respect to services performed in a pay period by
any individual where any service is excepted by subdivision (2).
(21) Service performed by an inmate of a custodial or penal
institution.
(22) Service performed as a precinct election officer (as defined
in IC 3-5-2.1-82).
(23) Services performed by a direct seller:
(A) in the trade or business of:
(i) selling, or soliciting the sale of, consumer products or
services to any buyer on a buy-sell basis, deposit-commission
basis, or similar basis, in any place other than in a permanent
retail establishment; or
(ii) selling, or soliciting the sale of, consumer products or
services in any place other than in a permanent retail
establishment;
(B) when substantially all the remuneration, whether or not paid
in cash, for the performance of the services is directly related to
sales or other output, including performance of services, rather
than the number of hours worked; and
(C) when the services performed by the person are performed
pursuant to a written contract and the contract provides that the
person who performs the services will not be treated as an
employee for tax purposes under the contract.
Formerly: Acts 1947, c.208, s.803; Acts 1951, c.295, s.4; Acts
1957, c.299, s.13; Acts 1959, c.305, s.1; Acts 1967, c.310, s.11; Acts
1971, P.L.355, SEC.15. As amended by Acts 1977, P.L.262, SEC.14;
P.L.227-1983, SEC.3; P.L.2-1987, SEC.30; P.L.18-1987, SEC.28;
P.L.3-1995, SEC.147; P.L.21-1995, SEC.67; P.L.2-1996, SEC.267;
P.L.1-2003, SEC.70; P.L.178-2003, SEC.10; P.L.108-2006, SEC.7;
P.L.2-2007, SEC.292; P.L.171-2016, SEC.5; P.L.7-2019, SEC.2;
P.L.122-2019, SEC.17; P.L.211-2019, SEC.28; P.L.186-2025,
SEC.120.