12-803.Wages subject to collection.

Section 12-803 sets the dollar limit on every Illinois wage deduction order. For any work week, the amount subject to collection is the lesser of two figures: 15% of the gross wages, salary, commissions, and bonuses paid for that week, or the amount by which the debtor's disposable earnings for the week exceed 45 times the applicable minimum hourly wage. On that second figure, the statute names two possible minimum-wage benchmarks -- the federal minimum hourly wage under 29 USC 206(a)(1), or, for a wage deduction summons served on or after January 1, 2006, the Illinois minimum wage under Section 4 of the Minimum Wage Law -- and instructs that whichever of the two is greater, in effect when the wages are payable, is the one used in the 45-times calculation. Because the statute takes the lesser of the 15% figure and the disposable-earnings figure, a low-wage worker's protected floor typically controls, while a 15% cap limits what can be taken from a higher earner.

“Disposable earnings” has a precise meaning here: what is left of the paycheck after subtracting only the amounts the law requires to be withheld, such as taxes. Voluntary deductions -- a retirement contribution, a health-insurance premium the employee chose to have withheld -- are not part of that subtraction, so they do not shrink disposable earnings for purposes of this formula. The statute also forbids double-counting the other direction: no amount already required by law to be withheld may be taken out of what the creditor collects.

The section closes with a jurisdiction rule: this Illinois formula (and no other) governs regardless of where the compensation was earned or payable, and regardless of which state the employee lives in. The wage deduction notice prescribed in Section 12-805 spells out, for the debtor's benefit, that federal law uses a different formula -- the lesser of 25% of disposable earnings or the amount by which disposable earnings exceed 30 times the federal minimum hourly wage -- so a debtor served with an Illinois summons is looking at the state formula in this section, not the federal one.