Compute maximum garnishment under federal CCPA Title III.
Maximum weekly garnishment
—
25% of disposable
—
Above 30× min wage
—
Your breakdown
Updates live as you type| Test | Result |
|---|
The two-part federal ceiling
When a creditor wins a money judgment against you, federal law decides how much of your paycheck they can reach. The rule lives in Title III of the Consumer Credit Protection Act, enforced by the U.S. Department of Labor's Wage and Hour Division, and it sets a maximum, not a fixed amount. Your employer must take the smaller of two figures: 25 percent of your weekly disposable earnings, or the amount by which your disposable earnings exceed 30 times the federal minimum wage. This calculator runs both tests and reports the lower number, which is the most a typical consumer-debt garnishment can pull from a single weekly check.
The second test is a floor protection. At the current federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour, 30 times that is $217.50 a week. Disposable earnings at or below that line are completely shielded, no matter how large the judgment. That floor is the reason a low earner can sometimes have nothing garnished at all while a higher earner loses the full 25 percent.
Calculating disposable earnings
Disposable earnings are not the same as take-home pay, and this is where people miscalculate. Disposable earnings are gross pay minus the deductions required by law: federal, state, and local taxes, Social Security and Medicare, and any mandatory state unemployment or disability withholding. Voluntary deductions do not count. Your 401(k) contribution, health premiums, life insurance, and union dues are subtracted from your check but are not subtracted before the garnishment math. Enter the legally required net, or the calculator will understate what a creditor can take.
Walking through an $800 paycheck
Take a worker with $800 in weekly disposable earnings at the $7.25 federal minimum wage. The 25 percent test yields $200. The 30 times test gives $800 minus $217.50, which is $582.50. The smaller of the two is $200, so $200 is the federal maximum that can be garnished from that week's pay. The 25 percent cap is the binding constraint here, and it stays binding for anyone earning comfortably above the minimum-wage floor.
When the protections shift
These limits cover ordinary consumer debt such as credit cards, medical bills, and personal loans. Several categories blow past the 25 percent ceiling. Child support and alimony can reach 50 percent of disposable earnings if you are supporting another spouse or child, and up to 60 percent if you are not, with an extra 5 percent added when payments are more than 12 weeks behind. Federal student loan garnishment is capped lower, at 15 percent of disposable pay. Unpaid federal taxes follow their own IRS table with no Title III percentage limit at all. Many states also impose stricter, lower caps than the federal rule, and your employer must apply whichever law protects more of your wages.
This tool is for someone who has received a garnishment notice and wants to verify the employer is not over-withholding, or for anyone budgeting around a judgment they see coming. One practical note that surprises people: Title III also makes it illegal for an employer to fire you because your wages were garnished for a single debt. That protection narrows once a second debt enters the picture.
Can a creditor garnish more than one paycheck at a time?
Generally only one consumer-debt garnishment runs at a time, and the 25 percent cap applies to the total, not to each creditor separately. Support orders are the exception and take priority, which can leave little or no room for a competing consumer judgment in the same pay period.
Are bank accounts and benefits protected the same way?
Title III governs wages, not money already sitting in a bank account, where separate state exemption rules apply. Federal benefits such as Social Security, SSI, and veterans payments carry their own protections and are generally off limits to ordinary creditors, though they can still be reached for child support and federal debts.