What A Creditor Cannot Take
42 Pa.C.S. 8127 — wages at work, $300 of anything, and retirement money
Wages in the employer's hands are exempt, with a short list of exceptions. In Pennsylvania, wages, salaries and commissions are exempt from attachment while the employer holds them, except in a divorce action, for support, for board of four weeks or less, for a residential landlord's final judgment, for state higher education loans, and for restitution, costs, fines or bail ordered in a criminal case.
A landlord's attachment is limited to no more than 10% of the tenant's net wages each pay period, or a sum that keeps the tenant's net income at the federal poverty guidelines, whichever is less, and any security deposit the landlord kept is deducted from what it can attach unless it was applied to rent.
Beyond what is specifically exempt, property up to a value of $300 is exempt from attachment or execution on a judgment. The debtor may choose which items it covers, or take it in cash from the proceeds of a sale. It does not apply to a judgment for support.
- Clothing, Bibles and school books.
- Most retirement funds and accounts, including those under the Internal Revenue Code sections the statute lists, except contributions over $15,000 in a one-year period and those made within one year before a bankruptcy filing.
- Group insurance, accident and disability insurance payments, and workers' compensation payments.
Sources for this section (3)
- 42 Pa.C.S. 8123 — General monetary exemption
- 42 Pa.C.S. 8124 — Exemption of particular property
- 42 Pa.C.S. 8127 — Personal earnings exempt from process
Legal information, not legal advice. Verified as of September 2026. Applying it to a particular situation is the work of a licensed Pennsylvania attorney.