The term of the contract sets the term of the employer/employee relationship. If a contract, signed or verbal, is for 12 months, the individual is considered to have been employed for 12 months. If the contract is less than 12 months in duration, there is no employer/employee relationship outside the contract period. Therefore, Social Security counts only the months within the contract period toward the 60-month requirement.

For example, if a teacher works under a 10-month contract each year, he/she would receive 10 months credit toward the 60-month requirement each year and would have to work the last 6 years in Social Security covered employment in order to meet the "last 60-months in covered employment" GPO exemption.