How Much Can Be Garnished From Your Paycheck?

For an ordinary judgment creditor (credit card, medical bill, personal loan), federal law caps garnishment at the lesser of 25% of your disposable earnings or the amount by which your weekly disposable earnings exceed $217.50 (30 times the $7.25 federal minimum wage). 15 U.S.C. 1673(a). Many states protect more: California caps most garnishments at 20%, New York at 10% of gross income, Illinois at 15% of gross wages, and Texas, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and South Carolina bar ordinary wage garnishment almost entirely. When federal and state limits differ, the one that takes less from you controls. Use the calculator above to run both against your actual paycheck.

Disposable earnings are what remains of your pay after subtracting only the deductions required by law: federal, state, and local income tax withholding, Social Security, Medicare, and mandatory state programs like unemployment or disability insurance contributions (15 U.S.C. 1672(b)). Voluntary deductions do NOT reduce disposable earnings for garnishment math: health insurance premiums, 401(k) contributions, union dues, and wage assignments all still count as garnishable income even though you never see the money. This is the single most common calculation error, and it always runs against the employee.

Support orders have their own, much higher federal ceilings under 15 U.S.C. 1673(b)(2): up to 50% of disposable earnings if you support another spouse or dependent child besides the one covered by the order, and up to 60% if you do not. Each figure rises by 5 points (to 55% and 65%) when the support is more than 12 weeks in arrears. The amount actually withheld is set by the income withholding order itself, and some states cap support withholding below the federal maximum.

For ordinary consumer debts, generally no: a creditor must sue you, win a judgment, and then apply for a garnishment order. If you have not been served with a lawsuit, the immediate risk is a lawsuit, not a garnishment. The exceptions all involve government-connected debts that skip the court step: defaulted federal student loans (administrative wage garnishment after a 30-day notice), IRS and state tax levies, and child support orders, which typically include income withholding from the start.

Four states bar wage garnishment for ordinary private debts: Texas (Tex. Const. art. XVI, s. 28), Pennsylvania (42 Pa.C.S. 8127), North Carolina (no procedure for private judgments), and South Carolina for consumer debts (S.C. Code 37-5-104). New Hampshire reaches nearly the same result by exempting all wages earned after the writ is served, so there is no continuing garnishment. Two cautions: child support, taxes, and federal student loans can still be collected from wages in all of these states, and money that lands in your bank account loses wage protection in most of them and can be frozen by a bank levy instead.

A defaulted federal student loan can be collected by administrative wage garnishment of up to 15% of disposable pay, without a court judgment, after a written 30-day notice with hearing rights (20 U.S.C. 1095a; 34 C.F.R. 34.19). The federal floor still applies: the first $217.50 of weekly disposable earnings cannot be touched. A private student loan gets no special federal treatment: the lender must sue and win like any other creditor, and some states set special caps for it (Georgia and Utah 15%, Washington 15% above a higher floor).

Not on top of each other for the same type of debt. The federal cap applies to your aggregate garnishment, so two judgment creditors cannot take 25% each: the second one waits in line until the first is paid off or its writ expires. A child support order is different: it has priority, uses its own higher cap, and shrinks the room left for ordinary creditors. If support is already taking 25% or more of your disposable earnings, an ordinary judgment creditor generally collects nothing until that changes.

The tools are paperwork, filed fast: (1) a claim of exemption, the court form that tells the judge your income is protected (head-of-family status, low income, poverty-line rules, or exempt sources like Social Security); (2) a hardship motion, which several states allow to reduce the percentage when the garnishment leaves you unable to cover necessities; (3) a settlement offer, because many creditors will stop a garnishment in exchange for a lump sum or payment plan; and (4) bankruptcy, which stops most garnishments immediately through the automatic stay. Deadlines for exemption claims are short, often 10 to 20 days from the notice, so the date on your garnishment paperwork matters more than anything on this page.

Wages, salary, commissions, and bonuses all count as earnings under the federal definition (15 U.S.C. 1672(a)), as do periodic pension and retirement payments. Cash tips kept by the employee generally are not payable by the employer and are not garnishable through payroll, though tips run through the paycheck (credit card tips, tip pools) commonly are. Independent contractor pay is not "earnings" under the CCPA percentage caps in many states, which paradoxically can leave contractors with less protection: a creditor may try to take 100% of an invoice payment through a non-wage garnishment, subject to state exemptions.

Federal law forbids firing you because your earnings are garnished for any one debt, no matter how many writs that single debt generates (15 U.S.C. 1674(a)). The federal protection runs out at a second, unrelated garnishment, but many states extend it: several make any garnishment-based discharge unlawful and give you a claim for reinstatement and lost wages. An employer who refuses to process a garnishment does not help you either: the court can hold the employer liable for the amounts it should have withheld.

The percentage caps stay the same, and the protected dollar floor scales with the pay period under 29 C.F.R. 870.10: at the $7.25 federal minimum wage the floor is $217.50 weekly, $435.00 biweekly, $471.25 semimonthly, and $942.50 monthly. States that use their own multiple (40x, 45x, 48x, 50x, or 60x a state minimum wage) scale the same way. The calculator above handles all four pay frequencies and shows the floor it used.

It shows the legal ceiling, the most that can lawfully be withheld this pay period for the debt type you selected. The court order or levy notice in your case controls the actual amount, which can be lower (a judge reduced it, the creditor asked for less, the balance is almost paid) but should never be higher. If your pay stub shows more being taken than the ceiling here, compare the employer math against your state worksheet: garnishment calculation errors are common enough that several states require the employer to hand you the calculation with each check.