TDIU: Paid at 100% When You Can’t Work

The regulation is 38 CFR 4.16. Its core question is whether service-connected disabilities keep you from obtaining and keeping substantially gainful employment. The standard (schedular) route also requires either:

• a single service-connected condition rated 60% or higher, or
• several service-connected conditions that combine to 70% or higher, with one of them at 40% or higher.

Fall short of those numbers but still can’t work because of service-connected conditions? The VA can refer the case for extraschedular TDIU consideration.

An award of TDIU means payment at the full 100% rate. Under the rates effective December 1, 2025, a single veteran with no dependents receives $3,938.58 per month. With a spouse it’s $4,158.17, and with a spouse and one child it’s $4,318.99.

Want to see the gap between that and what you get now? Try our VA disability calculator.

A note on Illinois property taxes

Illinois’ Standard Homestead Exemption for Veterans with Disabilities is tiered by your VA disability percentage: $2,500 off equalized assessed value at 30–49%, $5,000 at 50–69%, and the first $250,000 of EAV exempt at 70% or more. It has to be filed every year. Because TDIU pays at the 100% rate without changing your schedular percentages, ask your county assessment office, in Rock Island County or wherever you live, how your award letter is applied.

The VA cares about substantially gainful work, not every dollar you earn. Marginal employment generally doesn’t count against you. That includes income under the federal poverty threshold for one person, or a job in a sheltered setting, such as a relative’s business that bends the rules to accommodate your limits.

Around the Quad Cities, that might look like a few hours a week helping at a family shop in Moline, or seasonal help on a relative’s farm out past Port Byron. Because the specifics decide the outcome, write down exactly what you do, how often, and what accommodations you get.

• VA Form 21-8940 (Veteran’s Application for Increased Compensation Based on Unemployability) asks for your education, job history, and what you’ve earned.
• VA Form 21-4192 goes to employers from your recent work history so they can verify dates, duties, and why you left.
• Medical and vocational opinions explain which tasks your service-connected conditions rule out.

The VA won’t count your age or any condition that isn’t service-connected. Your evidence has to show that the service-connected disabilities themselves are what stand between you and a job.