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Jan­u­ary 2023 Con­sumer Law Updates

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Hello & Happy New Year!

Wel­come to the Legal­Con­sumer Newsletter!

Wel­come to 2023. Here’s an update of what’s changed in 2022, and what’s com­ing in 2023, including:

Lots of year-​end news and things to look for in 2023, so let’s get right to it!

Jan­u­ary 2023 Update

Oba­macare News for 2023

Bank­ruptcy News for 2023

Bank­ruptcy Changes in 2022

  • New Treat­ment of Stu­dent Loan “Undue Hard­ship” cases in Bankruptcy?
    (Under the Biden admin­is­tra­tion, the Depart­ment of Edu­ca­tion has been instructed to take a much more gen­er­ous stance toward the “undue hard­ship” stan­dard for stu­dent loans dis­charged in bank­ruptcy under sec­tion 523(a)(8).)
  • Updated Fed­eral Bank­ruptcy Fil­ing Fees
    adjusted for every 3 years for inflation
  • New Tem­po­rary Chap­ter 13 Debt Limit
    (a lim­ited, two-​year increase in the Chap­ter 13 debt limit to more than $2M, with secured and unse­cured debt lumped together)
  • 2022 Infla­tion Adjust­ments to Fed­eral Bank­ruptcy Amounts
    • 2022 adjusted for infla­tion every 3 years, for 
      • Debt Lim­its
      • Fil­ing fee
        • Chap­ter 7 — $338
        • Chap­ter 13 — $313
      • Exemp­tions
        • Exemp­tion: Amount
          Home­stead  — § 522(d)(1) $27,900
          Motor Vehi­cle  — § 522(d)(2)    $4,450
          House­hold Goods  — § 522(d)(3)
          — Per Item Limit
          — Aggre­gate Limit          		 $700
          $14,875
          Jew­elry  — § 522(d)(4)    $1,875
          Wild Card  — § 522(d)(5)
          — Any prop­erty
          — Unused home­stead under § 522(d)(1)          		 $1,475
          $13,950
          Tools of the Trade —  § 522(d)(6)    $2,800
          Unma­tured Life Insur­ance — § 522(d)(8)  $14,875
          Per­sonal Injury Claims — § 522(d)(11)(D)  $27,900
      • Means Test
        • Dol­lar amounts under the means test for deter­min­ing whether a pre­sump­tion of abuse exists, based on the debtor’s income after expenses over a 60-​month period, are now: (i) $9,075 ($151.25 per month based on 60 period) or 25% of non­pri­or­ity unse­cured debt, whichever is greater, or (ii) $15,150 ($252.50 per month). 11 U.S.C. § 707(b)(2)(A)(i).

Updated Inflation-​Adjusted State Exemp­tion Amounts 2022–2023

Bank­ruptcy & stu­dent loan “hard­ship dis­charges” — Changes afoot!

Whether or not the Biden for­give­ness pro­gram is allowed to pro­ceed,  there are other changes afoot, in a dif­fer­ent legal area, regard­ing the treat­ment of stu­dent loan “hard­ship dis­charges” in bank­ruptcy.

Lawyers for the Depart­ment of Edu­ca­tion have been issued guid­ance on how to han­dle undue hard­ship cases in the future.

These new guide­lines are aimed at mak­ing these cases more pre­dictable and may allow you to eval­u­ate your chances of dis­charge against the stan­dards laid out in the new stan­dard­ized affi­davit.

You can view the text of the new affi­davit and are work­ing on an auto­mated ver­sion of the form that you can com­plete and email to a local bank­ruptcy lawyer if you think you might have a case.

Wage Gar­nish­ment Exemptions

The NCLC has also pub­lished an excel­lent sum­mary of wage gar­nish­ment laws in all 50 states.

 

Com­ing Sep­tem­ber 1, 2023 New Cal­i­for­nia Wage Gar­nish­ment Law:

  • Effec­tive Sep­tem­ber 1, 2023, pur­suant to Cal­i­for­nia SB 1477,
    • gar­nish­ment is lim­ited to the lesser of:
      • 20% of dis­pos­able earn­ings or
      • 40% of the amount by which earn­ings exceed the greater of 
        • 48 times the state or local min­i­mum wage.
    • Cal. Civ. Proc. Code § 706.050 (West).
    • (Prior to that date, gar­nish­ment is lim­ited to the lesser of
      • 25% of dis­pos­able earn­ings or
      • 50% of the amount by which earn­ings exceed
        • 40 times the state or fed­eral min­i­mum wage )
  • Larger exemp­tions are avail­able if debtor can prove need:
    • “the por­tion of the judg­ment debtor’s earn­ings which the judg­ment debtor proves is nec­es­sary for the sup­port of the judg­ment debtor or the judg­ment debtor’s fam­ily sup­ported in whole or in part by the judg­ment debtor is exempt from levy under this chapter.”
    • Cal. Civ. Proc. Code § 706.051 (West).

Source —  NCLC

Elec­tronic fil­ing for self-​represented debtors in bank­ruptcy expands across the nation

More and more fed­eral bank­ruptcy courts are offer­ing debtors the means to file bank­ruptcy elec­tron­i­cally with­out the need of a lawyer, or online service.

Stu­dent Loans News for 2023

Don’t be caught off-​guard when Stu­dent Loan Pay­ments resume mid-2023

After more than two years of for­bear­ance, many Amer­i­cans may have for­got­ten about their stu­dent loan debt. No one has had to make a stu­dent loan pay­ment on fed­eral stu­dent loans since Joe Biden has been in office (Jan­u­ary 2021). ( the cur­rent for­bear­ance actu­ally began with the CARES Act on March 27, 2020, before Biden was elected, in the early months of the Covid pandemic.)

Biden’s new stu­dent loan for­give­ness plan is stalled for now — but so are pay­ments — until mid-2023

The Biden admin­is­tra­tion took big steps on can­cel­ing fed­eral stu­dent debt in the fall, for­giv­ing up to $20,000 in fed­eral stu­dent loan debt for a cou­ple, (which, for many debtors, will wipe out their bal­ance entirely), but the courts have stalled that process. And the courts may thwart him.

The supreme court has put the Biden administration’s loan for­give­ness plan on hold.

The ques­tion before the court is whether the pres­i­dent has the con­sti­tu­tional author­ity to for­give that debt — whether the exec­u­tive branch can do that with­out con­gres­sional approval.

The Biden admin­is­tra­tion decided to post­pone the end of the for­bear­ance until 60 days after the court decides the sta­tus of the loan for­give­ness pro­gram (maybe August 29, 2023??) because the stu­dent loan for­give­ness pro­gram was timed to coin­cide with the end of loan for­bear­ance, which began with the cur­rent Covid pan­demic, So it remains the case that no fed­eral stu­dent loan pay­ments have been required since before Biden took office in Jan­u­ary of 2021.

Plan­ning for the com­ing restart of stu­dent loan payments

Now is the time to start think­ing about your options if stu­dent loan pay­ments resume some­time in the mid­dle of 2023.

Start­ing Points for Stu­dent Loan Research: Issues to Start Researching

Check out these arti­cles to learn about get­ting ready for 2023.

 

Co-​signers, and par­ents, are you ready for what’s coming?

Did you know that if you’ve co-​signed for your child’s stu­dent loan, loan pay­ments can be deducted from your monthly social secu­rity check if you don’t pay them?

  • Read all about it in this arti­cle we pub­lished about prepar­ing for pay­ments to resume in 2023.
  • Also keep in mind what the Fed­eral Stu­dent Aid web­site has to say about prepar­ing for pay­ments to resume:
    • From stu​den​taid​.gov/​a​n​n​o​u​n​c​e​m​e​n​t​s​-​e​v​e​n​t​s​/​c​o​v​i​d​-19 

Prepar­ing for Repay­ment to Resume (from Fed­er­al­Stu­den­tAid website)

Here are four steps to make sure you’re pre­pared for stu­dent loan pay­ments to resume:

  1. Update your con­tact infor­ma­tion in your pro­file on your loan ser­vicer’s* web­site and in your Stu​den​tAid​.gov pro­file.

  2. Review your auto-​debit enroll­ment or sign up for the first time. To do so, log in to your loan servicer’s* web­site or con­tact your loan ser­vicer directly.

  3. Check out Loan Sim­u­la­tor to find a repay­ment plan that meets your needs and goals or to decide whether to consolidate.

  4. Con­sider apply­ing for an income-​driven repay­ment (IDR) plan. An IDR plan can make your pay­ments more afford­able, depend­ing on your income and fam­ily size.

(*Loan Ser­vicer —  A com­pany that col­lects pay­ments, responds to cus­tomer ser­vice inquiries, and per­forms other admin­is­tra­tive tasks asso­ci­ated with main­tain­ing a fed­eral stu­dent loan on behalf of a lender. If you’re unsure of who your fed­eral stu­dent loan ser­vicer is, you can look it up in “My Fed­eral Stu­dent Aid.”)

If you haven’t taken advan­tage of the var­i­ous income-​based repay­ment options, now is the time to get famil­iar with them and fig­ure out which ones may help you man­age your stu­dent loan debt.

Other Stu­dent Loan Relief Pro­grams, Attempted and Oth­er­wise, Go For­ward. (Thank You, Joe Biden!)

The treat­ment of var­i­ous aspects of stu­dent loan debt under the Biden admin­is­tra­tion is in many ways an about-​face from the treat­ment of stu­dent loans under the Trump admin­is­tra­tion — under the lead­er­ship of Betsy DeVos.

Under DeVos’s lead­er­ship, the Depart­ment of Edu­ca­tion took a hard-​line stance when it came to for­giv­ing loans from failed pri­vate uni­ver­si­ties (Corinthian, ITT, West­wood, and Marinello, for exam­ple) that gave stu­dents worth­less degrees after tak­ing thou­sands from them in loan agree­ments, after promis­ing a high like­li­hood of high-​income jobs upon get­ting a degree from them when, in fact, such prospects were unlikely, and the degree from the edu­ca­tional insti­tu­tional car­ried lit­tle or no weight in the job market.

The Biden admin­is­tra­tion has taken a much more gen­er­ous approach towards for­giv­ing loans of stu­dents of failed uni­ver­si­ties, where peo­ple ended up with worth­less degrees.

The Biden admin­is­tra­tion released a series of rule changes that should make it eas­ier for many stu­dent loan debtors to get relief, accord­ing to this NCLC article

They men­tion the following:

Source: Twelve Dra­matic Changes Offer­ing Relief for Stu­dent Loan Bor­row­ers. — Sep­tem­ber 06, 2022

Unem­ploy­ment News for 2023

Pandemic-​enhanced unem­ploy­ment ben­e­fits have come to an end

Wage & Hour News for 2023

27 States have updated their min­i­mum wage for 2023

We’ve incor­po­rated the 2023 changes into our city, county, & state min­i­mum wage listings.

Many cities and coun­ties have their own min­i­mum wage laws. Click on the state and then click on the popup to drill down to your county to learn about your local min­i­mum wage laws.

See Also: Raises From Coast to Coast in 2023 — National Employ­ment Law Project: — Decem­ber 21, 2022

 

Wage Gar­nish­ment

The NCLC has also pub­lished an excel­lent sum­mary of wage gar­nish­ment laws in all 50 states.

Com­ing later in 2023

Cal­i­for­nia Gar­nish­ment Effec­tive Sep­tem­ber 1, 2023:

  • Pur­suant to Cal­i­for­nia SB 1477, gar­nish­ment is lim­ited to the lesser of 20% of dis­pos­able earn­ings or 40% of the amount by which earn­ings exceed the greater of 48 times the state or local min­i­mum wage. 
    • Cal. Civ. Proc. Code § 706.050 (West).
  • (Prior to that date, the lesser of 25% of dis­pos­able earn­ings or 50% of the amount by which earn­ings exceed 40 times the state or fed­eral min­i­mum wage can be garnished.)
  • Larger exemp­tions are avail­able if debtor can prove need: “the por­tion of the judg­ment debtor’s earn­ings which the judg­ment debtor proves is nec­es­sary for the sup­port of the judg­ment debtor or the judg­ment debtor’s fam­ily sup­ported in whole or in part by the judg­ment debtor is exempt from levy under this chap­ter.” Cal. Civ. Proc. Code § 706.051 (West).

 

What’s com­ing in 2023?

God bless the fine folks at the NCLC who put out this incred­i­bly use­ful list of con­sumer law changes com­ing in 2023:

Source: National Con­sumer Law Cen­ter -Jan­u­ary 03, 2023

Where & What Data for 2022

Where You’re From & What You Read in 2022

Well, it’s time for our annual year-​end review of the pre­vi­ous year’s web­site traffic.

Every year, peo­ple like you from every state, turn to Legal​Con​sumer​.com for infor­ma­tion about laws that affect their every­day lives.

We’re always inter­ested in where you’re from and what you’re read­ing. We thought you might be, too.

Here’s where you all came from in 2022.

Where You’re From

(All States — 903,541 Users )

States

  1. Cal­i­for­nia — 75,362 users
  2. Texas — 61,279 users
  3. New York 57,452 users
  4. Illi­nois — 48,931 users
  5. Florida — 48,377 users
  6. Geor­gia — 47,474 users
  7. Penn­syl­va­nia — 35,720 users
  8. North Car­olina — 33,967 users
  9. Vir­ginia — 31,562 Users
  10. Ohio — 30,241 Users
  11. Ten­nessee — 28,498 users
  12. Wash­ing­ton — 21,692 users
  13. Mis­souri — 20,082 users
  14. Michi­gan — 20,058 users
  15. New Jer­sey — 19,527 users
  16. Col­orado — 19,087 users
  17. Indi­ana — 18,724 users
  18. Ari­zona — 18,371 users
  19. Ken­tucky — 17,677 users
  20. Mary­land — 16,933 users

Metro Areas

  1. New York, NY — 53,754 users
  2. Chicago, IL — 39,324 users
  3. Los Ange­les, CA — 35,361 users
  4. Atlanta, GA — 34,626 users
  5. Wash­ing­ton DC (Hag­ger­stown, MD) — 29,855 users
  6. Dal­las-Fort Worth — 25,739 users
  7. Philade­phia, PA — 23,890 users
  8. Boston, MA — 17,282 Manchester-​NH — users
  9. Seat­tle-Tacoma, WA — 16,518 users
  10. San Fran­cisco-Oak­land-San Jose, CA — 16,423 users
  11. Den­ver, CO — 16,408 users
  12. Phoenix, AZ — 15,700 users
  13. Nashville, TN — 14,066 users
  14. Char­lotte, NC — 13,542 users
  15. Hous­ton, TX — 13,276 users
  16. Orlando-Day­tona Beach-Mel­bourne, FL — 12,280 users
  17. Min­neapo­lis-St. Paul, MN — 11,419 users
  18. Tampa-St. Peters­burg, FL — 11,170 users
  19. Indi­anapo­lis, IN — 9,910 users
  20. Raleigh-Durham (Fayet­teville), NC 9,665 — users

What You’re Read­ing — in 2022

OVERVIEW: Sub­ject Areas in 2022 (Page Views)

  1. Democ­racy /​ Elected Offi­cials — 643,933
  2. Inher­i­tance Law /​ Pro­bate Courts) — 444,724
  3. Child Cus­tody /​ Fam­ily Courts) — 304,225
  4. Unem­ploy­ment Law /​ Unem­ploy­ment Offices — 226, 905
  5. Bank­ruptcy /​ Means Test Cal­cu­la­tor & Bank­ruptcy Court — 154, 203
  6. Wage and Hour Law /​ Min­i­mum Wage /​ Tips — 130,914
  7. Oba­macare /​ Rates & Providers — 122,380
  8. Stu­dent Loans  — 16,140
  9. Lawyers — 9,149

BY SUBJECT AREA:

Inher­i­tance Law pages (444,724 total views)

  1. Local Pro­bate Court Page — 136,065 views
  2. Home page — 66,647 views
  3. Top­ics — 227,008 views 
    1. State Inher­i­tance Tax  (topic 4) — 69,640 page views
    2. How Pro­bate Works (topic 20) — 39,928 page views
    3. How to Han­dle A Small Estate (topic 7) — 30,034 page views
    4. What you need to know about inher­i­tance law (topic 28) — 21,039 page views
    5. Who Inher­its if your Spouse or Par­ent Dies with­out a Will? (topic 39) — 20,709 page views
    6. How to get a TaxID num­ber in your state. (topic 19) — 15,858 page views

Bank­ruptcy pages (154, 203 total)

  1. Means Test — 49,697 page views
  2. Bank­ruptcy Court — 50,757 page views
  3. Exemp­tions — 18,342 page views
  4. Top­ics — 11,703 page views
  5. Bank­ruptcy Lawyers — 7,070 page views
  6. Fil­ing Bank­ruptcy — 3,875 page views
  7. Bank­ruptcy News — 641 page views

Child Cus­tody pages (304,225 total)

  1. County Fam­ily Court — 139,499 page views
  2. Home page — 55,932 page views
  3. Topic Pages = 107,054 page views 
    1. How to Enforce a Child Cus­tody Order in Your State (topic 5) — 49,244 page views
    2. How State Courts Make Child Cus­tody Deci­sions  (topic 2)  — 27,104
    3. How Does Child Cus­tody Work in My State?  (topic 7) — 12,427
    4. How To Find A Child Cus­tody Lawyer?  (topic 3) — 9,286

Oba­macare pages (122,380 total)

  1. Rates and Providers — 24,288 page views
  2. Home page — 11,311 page views
  3. Topic Pages = 90,511 page views 
    1. What State Res­i­dents Need to Know About Oba­macare  (topic 8) — 35,724
    2. Do I Have to Get Health Insur­ance in My State? (topic 5) — 25,010
    3. Do I have to get health insur­ance?  (topic 84) — 2,124

Democ­racy pages (643,993 views)

  1. Elected Offi­cials — 351,282+256,537 page views
  2. Home page — 256,537 page views
  3. Topic Pages = 36,393 page views 
    1. State Leg­is­la­tor List  (topic 44) — 975
    2. Who Are Your States Rep­re­sen­ta­tives In Your State’s Leg­is­la­ture?  (topic 45) — 871
    3. How to call your Con­gres­sional Rep­re­sen­ta­tive  (topic 16) — 702
    4. How to Con­firm or Update Your Voter Reg­is­tra­tion  (topic 57) — 290

Wage & Hour pages (130,914 total)

  1. Min­i­mum Wage — 42,094 page views
  2. Home page — 25,161 page views
  3. Topic Pages = 63,013 page views 
    1. What are my rights to Tips?  (topic 4 or 5) — 39,593
    2. What are my rights to Time Off?  (topic 1) — 9,286

Thanks!

See you next month!

About Albin Renauer

Albin Renauer is the founder of Legal Consumer, which he began in 2006 as an online companion to his book, How to File for Chapter 7 Bankruptcy. Albin received his J.D. from the University of Michigan Law School in 1985. He worked for various public-interest law firms in the Bay Area and also as a staff attorney for Chief Justice Rose Bird of the California Supreme Court. He also spent 17 years as an editor at Nolo, where he helped create numerous books and software programs, including the bestselling WillMaker. He edited Law on the Net, the first online directory of legal resources and was the architect of Nolo's Webby Award winning website during the dot-com boom.