Staff Pay Raises in 2026: 64% Budget Just 1% to 3%

Most independent medical practices are planning a small raise for staff in 2026. MGMA's September 2025 poll of 349 medical groups found 64% budgeted a base pay increase of just 1% to 3%, while 23% budgeted 4% to 6% and 10% set aside no base pay increase at all.

Only 1% of the groups MGMA surveyed budgeted a raise of 7% or more. That leaves the typical practice budgeting well under what several front-line roles actually gained in market pay over the past year, a gap that shows up clearly once the role-level numbers are compared with the budget bands.

What the 2026 Budget Poll Found

MGMA's poll, published September 9, 2025, asked practice leaders how they were budgeting staff base pay for 2026. Of the 349 applicable responses, 64% picked the 1% to 3% band, 23% picked 4% to 6%, 1% picked 7% or higher, and 10% said no increase was budgeted for base pay at all.

The same poll found that 64% of practices benchmark staff compensation at least once a year, a practice MGMA ties to keeping pay bands aligned with turnover risk. That leaves more than a third of practices setting pay without a regular benchmarking check, even as the roles below show how fast market rates can move.

How 2026 Compares to a Year Earlier

MGMA ran a similar poll in September 2024, ahead of 2025 budgets, with 352 applicable responses. That year, 35% of leaders said they were budgeting more than usual for competitive pay, 50% said about the usual amount, and 15% said less than normal. The median planned increase across all staff was 3.25%, with front desk staff at a 4.5% median, medical assistants and nurse practitioners at 5.5%, and other nurse and advanced practice roles at 5%.

Source: MGMA Stat polls, September 2024 and September 2025.

Several 2025 respondents told MGMA their above-average budgets were a direct response to minimum wage legislation in their state, not a broader retention strategy. That detail matters heading into 2026, since a practice budgeting only 1% to 3% is assuming market pay pressure has eased, which the role-level data below does not support.

The pattern is not new. A summer 2022 MGMA survey found more than six in 10 practices planned a 3% to 5% cost-of-living or merit increase for 2023 support staff, and a December 2021 poll found roughly half of practices had already budgeted more heavily for 2022 raises than in prior years. Budgeted increases have moved lower each cycle since then, even as the roles below kept gaining pay in the open market.

Practice leaders reading the 2026 figures side by side with 2022 and 2023 should note the direction: budget bands have compressed toward the low end over four straight cycles, while the underlying role-level pay data below shows the opposite trend for several clinical and administrative positions.

That divergence is the part a flat percentage budget line misses. A single across-the-board number can look disciplined on a spreadsheet while still falling far short for the specific roles a practice is most exposed on, as the role-level figures below show.

Which Roles Saw the Biggest Pay Gains

MGMA's compensation data shows registered nurse pay rose 11.9% year over year, and triage nurse pay rose 14.3% in the same period. Triage nurse pay has grown 84% over the past ten years, and RN hourly rates are now roughly $11 higher than in 2020.

Management roles moved too. Supervisor pay rose about 12% year over year, and senior and general manager pay rose about 11%. General accounting staff saw the sharpest single-year jump, up 17.4%. None of those roles are the ones a 1% to 3% base pay budget is built to cover, which is the mismatch practice leaders should check against their own turnover-sensitive positions before finalizing a 2026 budget.

Executive Pay Moves the Other Way

MGMA's data also points to a compression problem at the top of the org chart. Practice executives with 21 or more years of experience earn about $3,500 less than newly hired executives in comparable roles, according to MGMA's compensation figures. Tenured leaders are being budgeted at or below what practices pay to bring someone in from outside, the reverse of the pattern in clinical and support staff pay.

That reversal is worth flagging separately from the front-line numbers, since a practice that budgets flat raises for long-tenured managers while raising entry-level clinical pay 11% to 14% is narrowing two different pay gaps at once, in opposite directions.

What the Gap Means for 2026 Budgets

The numbers point to a specific planning risk. A practice that follows the majority pattern, a 1% to 3% base pay increase, is budgeting for roughly a quarter of the market movement MGMA measured in registered nurse pay and roughly a fifth of the movement in triage nurse pay. For a practice with a handful of RNs or triage staff near a pay ceiling, that gap can be the difference between a renewal and a resignation.

None of this means every practice needs to match a 14.3% raise. It means the 1% to 3% figure only holds up for roles where market pay actually moved 1% to 3%, and MGMA's own role-level data shows several roles moved well past that. Checking role-specific market data before setting a single across-the-board number, rather than after turnover shows up in the numbers, is the difference the 64% who benchmark annually are already acting on.

Sources

• MGMA, "Budgeting competitive, sustainable 2026 staff pay for your medical practice," September 9, 2025
• MGMA, "Budgeting medical practice staff cost-of-living, merit increases for 2025," September 10, 2024