Garnishing an Employee’s Wages

If certain statutory requirements are met, an employer who receives a garnishment notice concerning an employee is required to garnish the appropriate amount from the employee’s wages.290 The maximum amount which may be garnished from an employee’s wages is the lesser of 25 percent of the employee’s disposable earnings or the amount by which the debtor’s disposable earnings exceed the product of 40 times the federal minimum wage times the number of work weeks in the pay period.291 Special rules may apply where the underlying judgment is for child support. “Disposable earnings” is defined as the earnings remaining after deduction from those earnings of amounts required by law to be withheld.