Methodology & Data Sources

Data Sources

PlainBankruptcy draws from three official sources to provide full context around bankruptcy filing trends:

• Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts (AOUSC) Judicial Caseload Statistics - The primary source. Published annually, this covers aggregate filing counts by bankruptcy chapter (7, 11, 12, 13) and judicial district. Source: uscourts.gov
• BLS Local Area Unemployment Statistics - Annual unemployment rates by state, used to provide economic context alongside filing trends. Source: bls.gov/lau
• U.S. Census Bureau - Population data used to calculate per-capita filing rates for fair cross-state and cross-district comparisons. Source: census.gov/popest

Data Vintage & Coverage

PlainBankruptcy covers fiscal years 2015 through 2024 - 10 years of federal bankruptcy filing data. Coverage includes all 90 active federal judicial districts. Data represents aggregate statistical counts, not individual case records.

Populations & vintages

Three populations sit next to each other on this site and are not the same vintage:

• AOUSC filings - federal fiscal year (October–September); our extract tip is FY2024 across 90 districts.
• BLS unemployment (LAUS) - calendar-year state rates; our extract tip is 2023 (series begins 2019). State pages label each series with its own year; do not read a 2023 unemployment rate as an FY2024 filing-year match.
• Census population estimates - used only to compute per-capita filing rates for the matching filing year.

Historic fiscal-year rows (FY2015–FY2023) in the ETL are intentional time-series seeds, not stale pins of “current” data.

How We Process the Data

Our ETL pipeline ingests data from three federal sources, normalizes it, and produces the integrated dataset that powers all page types on PlainBankruptcy. The pipeline follows this sequence:

1. Download annual Judicial Caseload Statistics tables from the AOUSC website for each fiscal year in the coverage period
2. Parse filing counts by district, chapter (7, 11, 12, 13), and year from the semi-structured statistical tables
3. Join with Census Bureau population estimates to compute per-capita filing rates (filings per 100,000 residents) for fair cross-district comparison
4. Join with BLS Local Area Unemployment Statistics to provide economic context for trend analysis (calendar-year LAUS vs federal-fiscal filings, see §populations)
5. Aggregate district-level data to state and national totals, preserving chapter-level breakdowns at each geographic level
6. Compute year-over-year change metrics and multi-year trend indicators
7. Load into our search-optimized SQLite database serving district, state, and national pages

Per-Capita Calculations

Per-capita filing rates use Census Bureau population estimates for the corresponding year. Rates are expressed as filings per 100,000 residents, enabling fair comparison across districts and states with very different population sizes. Without per-capita normalization, large states would always appear to have more bankruptcy filings simply due to population, making direct comparisons misleading. The per-capita rate reveals the true intensity of bankruptcy activity relative to the resident population.

Corpus placement (#N of M)

State and district pages show where each entity sits in the PlainBankruptcy AOUSC corpus, not just the entity's own filing counts. Placement uses two ladders that can diverge, so a single "#N of M" never pretends one metric is the whole story.

• States - per-capita rate: rank among 51 jurisdictions for the latest fiscal year, ordered by filings per 100,000 residents (highest rate = #1). Compact high-rate states such as Alabama typically lead this ladder.
• States - raw volume: rank by summed FY filings (highest count = #1). Large states such as California or Texas can lead volume while sitting mid-pack or lower on per-capita rate.
• Districts - filing volume: rank among the 90 federal districts by FY total filings (highest count = #1).
• Districts - Chapter 13 share: rank by Chapter 13's share of Chapter 7+13 filings (highest Ch.13 share = #1). A high-volume consumer district can lead absolute filings while sitting low on the repayment-plan share ladder.

Ties break by entity name (A-Z). Ranks are recomputed from the live filings table on each request (cached in-process); they are inventory placement inside this corpus, not a credit score or legal advice about any debtor.

Limitations

• PlainBankruptcy presents aggregate statistical data only, we have no access to individual case records (those are in PACER, the federal court system's public access portal)
• Bankruptcy statistics are filed by fiscal year (October–September), not calendar year
• Chapter 12 (family farmer) filings are relatively rare and may show as zero in many districts
• This is statistical information only, not legal advice

How the Source Agency Collects Data

The Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts compiles bankruptcy filing statistics from the active federal judicial districts that report bankruptcy caseload - 90 districts in the tables we ingest. When an individual or business files a bankruptcy petition with a U.S. Bankruptcy Court clerk's office, the case is recorded in the court's Case Management/Electronic Case Files (CM/ECF) system. The AOUSC aggregates these filings into annual statistical tables that break down cases by chapter, district, and filing type (business vs. non-business). These statistical publications represent the official count of bankruptcy activity in the federal court system.

Data Accuracy Commitment

PlainBankruptcy presents AOUSC and Census data without modification. Filing counts, per-capita rates, and trend calculations are computed directly from the published source data. We do not estimate filing counts for unreported periods or adjust figures. If you find any data that appears incorrect, please contact us and we will verify against the source publications.

Data reuse, licensing & monetization posture

Readiness only, no paid products or affiliate units are live. This section inventories what is productized today so journalists, researchers, and future operators know the boundaries. Activating pricing, API keys, affiliate placements, or alternative ad networks requires explicit operator sign-off.

Downloadable & embeddable today

• aousc-state-filings.csv - the compiled state-level AOUSC bankruptcy filing statistics table.
• /og/state/[slug].png and /og/district/[slug].png - shareable summary images per state and per federal judicial district.
• /feed/watchlist.xml - a private, URL-addressable RSS feed of a reader's saved-district/state filing updates (see My list); nothing is persisted server-side.
• Per-page Cite this page blocks across methodology, statistics, rankings, research, and district/state detail pages - attribution-ready citation strings.

License & attribution

The underlying AOUSC Judicial Caseload Statistics and Census Bureau figures are U.S. government works in the public domain. PlainBankruptcy's compiled comparison table, derived per-capita rates, and rankings are our own work - see Terms of Use for the personal, journalistic, and academic reuse terms already published there (attribution + link back; no bulk scraping or competing redistribution without written permission).

Affiliate & ad placement rules (if ever activated)

No affiliate units run today; display ads are limited to labeled Google AdSense slots when approved. If the operator later enables additional monetization: units must be clearly labeled; no units may run adjacent to the filing-statistics tables or district-comparison copy in a way that could read as a personalized "which bankruptcy attorney to hire" or "which filing is right for you" recommendation - this is YMYL-adjacent financial/legal content, so that adjacency rule is strict; density must respect the fleet Module 36 ceilings shared with AdSense. We present official caseload statistics, we do not sell legal or bankruptcy-filing services.

Alternative network eligibility (paperwork readiness)

Mediavine Journey and similar networks typically require roughly 1,000 real sessions per 28 days, original reference content, and a clean policy stack (privacy, terms, editorial policy - all present here). PlainBankruptcy carries an open rendered-sibling-divergence class fenced by its own measured similarity read; alternative-network application is not paperwork-blocked by that - the readiness criteria above (session volume, content originality, policy stack) are the actual gate, and session volume is the one this site has not yet crossed.

Contact

Questions about our methodology or found a data error? Reach us at hello@plainbankruptcy.com or through our contact page.