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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022
| Contributor Information
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
Compensation is rising for younger physicians (those under age 40), at a rate even higher than that for their older peers. Although pandemic-related financial challenges began receding in 2021, many still struggle with heavy workloads, long hours, and difficult situations with patients.
Of the more than 13,000 physicians who responded to our survey, nearly 2000 were under age 40. These young doctors provided a look into their salary and incentives, how they manage their finances, and their level of satisfaction in practicing medicine. The data for this year's report were collected October 5, 2021, through January 19, 2022.
(Note: Some chart data do not add to 100% due to rounding. Calculations and rankings are based on raw data.)
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
Physician income rebounded from stagnant or declining figures in the early part of the COVID-19 pandemic, when many practices shuttered as wary patients stayed away.
For employed physicians, reported compensation for patient care includes salary, bonus, and profit-sharing contributions. For self-employed physicians, it includes earnings after taxes and deductible business expenses, before income tax. Only full-time salaries are included in our results.
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
Like most respondents to our survey, physicians under age 40 reported faring better financially in 2021 than in 2020, when earnings averaged about $272,000 across the group. Still, young physicians earn about 15% less, on average, than physicians overall.
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
What may be just a few years' more experience translates into higher pay for young physicians overall. Primary care physicians (PCPs) in the age 35-39 cohort earn about 16% more than their younger peers, similar to specialists, for whom the difference in income between those age groups is about 13%.
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
A higher share of young physicians are women compared with doctors age 40 or older. The percentage of women in each age group has been fairly similar for 6 consecutive years.
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
As shown in our 2022 Physician Compensation Report, men continue to earn more than women, regardless of age or whether they are in specialties or in primary care. On average, young male physicians earn 37% more than their young female counterparts.
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
Young physicians in the West North Central region, which includes Minnesota and Missouri among other states, saw the sharpest rise in average compensation from our prior report (to $314,000 from $261,000). However, four of the 10 top-earning states for physicians overall are in the East Central region, where young physicians' average income rose to $308,000 from $275,000 in our 2021 report.
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
Although average income rose, 13% of physicians under age 40 said their income fell since our last report. Two thirds of the young physicians who saw their compensation slip cited COVID-related factors, similar to physicians overall (70%). A somewhat larger share of young physicians who took a pay cut blamed factors unrelated to the pandemic compared with their older peers (51% vs 43%). (Participants could choose more than one response.)
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
Working for a healthcare organization, hospital, large group practice, clinic, or other medical group continues to be popular among younger physicians, with nearly seven times as many employed as self-employed. There is still a clear preference for employment among older physicians as well, but the ratio is closer to 2:1 in that group.
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
As in last year's report, physicians younger than 40 earn the most, on average, in office-based single-specialty group practices. The largest average pay difference between younger and older physicians exists in outpatient clinics, the same as in last year's report, followed by that in hospitals.
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
A slim majority of young physicians feels satisfied with their compensation. One young anesthesiologist lamented her "higher-acuity, higher-volume" patient load at "less pay." Her sentiment was echoed by several others, including a young internist: "No change in compensation or work hours, but more workload because of the pandemic."
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
Although James Taylor, chief operating officer of AMN Healthcare's Leadership Solutions Division, says he is seeing "a decline in the number of clients offering a salary plus production bonus and an increase in those offering a straight salary," more than half (57%) of physicians overall still have an incentive bonus element to their income.
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
The share of employed female physicians under age 40 seeking promotion within their current practice setting dipped slightly, from 58% in our 2021 report, whereas their male counterparts sought advancement at about the same rate as before (60%). Among employed physicians age 40 or older, women were still a bit more likely to aim for promotion than were men (34% vs 29% in our 2021 report).
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
Some of COVID's harshest impact on physicians has receded. About 3 in 10 physicians under age 40 pointed to financial or practice-related ill effects due to the pandemic in 2021, down from nearly half (47%) the year before. Younger physicians were about as likely as their older peers (15%) to have not gotten a raise in 2021. (Participants could choose more than one response.)
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
About half of physicians younger than 40 are still carrying college or medical school loans, as was the case in our last report (52%). Again in this survey, about one fifth report paying off debt for a partner's higher education. Although their older peers are much less likely to have such debt (17% vs 7%), they are far more likely to shoulder college expenses (22%) or graduate school tuition (7%) for their kids. About one quarter of younger doctors note childcare as a major expense again this year. (Participants could choose more than one response.)
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
Among younger doctors, family physicians are more likely to still be paying off personal college or medical school loans than are internists, the same as in our prior report (64% and 41%, respectively). (Not all specialties had sufficient data for this chart.)
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
About the same share of younger physicians took no particular actions to reduce major expenses as in our last report (68%). Among those who did, young doctors who deferred or refinanced loans to reduce their short-term burden may have been aided by the extended COVID-related federal student loan payment pause, which allowed borrowers to defer payments without penalty or interest accrual. (Participants could choose more than one response.)
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
About 6 in 10 physicians, whether young or older, spend between 30 and 45 hours weekly seeing patients. Results for young doctors are about the same as in our prior report.
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
While about 6 in 10 younger physicians take 16 minutes or less with each of their patients, close to one fifth spend just a few more minutes. Their older peers are more likely to spend more than 16 minutes with each patient (50%).
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
Most physicians' work combines patient consultations with bureaucratic tasks — paperwork, EHR documentation, administrative and managerial work, participation in professional organizations, and clinical reading. Large majorities of both young and older physicians said they spend 10 or more hours each week on such duties (73% and 75%, respectively). The share of young physicians who spend 20 or more hours per week on bureaucratic tasks has about doubled since 2016 (18%).
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
Responses among young doctors reflect a similar shift in values that Medscape reported among their peers overall. For young physicians, making the world a better place has gained favor over the past few years, and patient gratitude and being good at their jobs have lost some impact (14%, 35%, and 27%, respectively, in our 2016 report).
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
Dealing with difficult patients, having long work hours, and having so many rules and regulations perennially appear among young physicians' top challenges. This year, physicians age 40 or older pointed to difficulties in working with electronic health records a bit more often (13%) than did their younger peers.
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
The share of physicians younger than 40 who would choose medicine again if they could redo their careers was down from 76% in our prior report. Older physicians (74% this year) seemed somewhat more content with their choice of vocation.
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
As in last year's report (88%), young ophthalmologists led or shared the top of this "if I could do it all over" list. As the pandemic has worn on, attitudes among younger doctors in critical care, emergency medicine, pathology, and neurology have soured extensively (88%, 74%, 75%, and 80% in our 2021 report, respectively). (Not all specialties had sufficient data for this chart.)
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
Young orthopedists and ophthalmologists are among those physicians most likely to say they would choose the same specialty, as they have been for several years. Internists and family physicians ages 40 and under were among the least likely to make that claim. Young general surgeons' enthusiasm for their specialty has fallen to the lowest spot, from a 90% affirmative response in our 2020 report. (Not all specialties had sufficient data for this chart.)
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
One third of young physicians took extra work to supplement their income, much like physicians overall (36%). About the same share did medical moonlighting as took on other medical-related work. (Participants could choose more than one response.)
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
Young physicians can feel fortunate in how many of them get medical insurance coverage through work — at a rate much higher than the national average. According to research from the Kaiser Family Foundation, only about half of the US population has insurance coverage through their employer.
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
Young physicians use a fee-for-service system as their primary means of payment at a much higher rate than that of a value-based payment model. In comparison, an even greater percentage of older physicians (47%) rely on fee-for-service as their primary system.
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
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Young Physician Compensation Report 2022: Rising Income; Tough Challenges
Mary Lyn Koval | September 23, 2022 | Contributor Information
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Comments on Medscape are moderated and should be professional in tone and on topic. You must declare any conflicts of interest related to your comments and responses. Please see our Commenting Guide for further information. We reserve the right to remove posts at our sole discretion.
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Mary Lyn Koval
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Disclosure: Mary Lyn Koval has disclosed no relevant financial relationships.
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