What is the 2020 Salary of a PA

The 2020 AAPA Salary report showed an increase in Physician Assistant salaries to $111,000 in 2019, an increase from $107,500 the previous year.

The AAPA is the national professional organization representing PAs, providing a range of services for PAs, including educational opportunities and advocacy for the PA profession. The AAPA collects salary data in February and releases an annual report on PA salaries based on the previous year.

Data for the annual AAPA salary report is collected based on a self-reported survey. The survey was available on the AAPA website and emailed to AAPA members who did not opt-out of email communication. The 2020 AAPA report had a total of 13,682 PAs respond to the survey.

The NCCPA and BLS salary reports benchmark the data by the AAPA and vary in how they collect the data. The NCCPA report looks at total PA income, averaged over time, and asks for salary ranges, instead of exact numbers. The BLS data is collected from employers and averages over several years.

Both the BLS and NCCPA have a much higher response rate than the AAPA report, as less than 10% of certified PAs responded to the AAPA survey. Other reports should be used to compare, due to the low response rate. The AAPA salary report is by far the most comprehensive on PA salaries; not only does it show base compensation, but it also shows data on bonuses, benefits, and overtime. It also breaks the data down by state and specialty.

New this year is a digital version of the report, which makes it easy to search the information for your given situation. Instead of scrolling through pages of data in a PDF, you can easily find the salary information for your state and specialty.

Although the AAPA salary report does not have a high response rate, the important thing is that it shows that PA salaries have continued to climb. PA salaries have seen increases in every PA salary report out there, with PA salaries increasing by about 3% the past year. 

If you’re looking at negotiating a job offer, these reports can give you a starting point for what to expect, but each job includes different benefits. You must look at the whole package when evaluating a PA job offer, and not just the salary alone.

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