Compliance Officer Salary in Pennsylvania: Pay by Experience, City & Take-Home

A compliance officer in Pennsylvania earns a median salary of $85,580 a year, or about $41.15 an hour, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (2025). Most of the field sits between roughly $63,280 at the 25th percentile and $130,990 at the top, so where you land depends heavily on industry, certifications, and which metro you work in. That median runs about $4,850 above the national figure for the role.

How Pennsylvania compares to the national average

Pennsylvania pays compliance officers slightly better than the country as a whole. The state median of $85,580 sits $4,850 above the national median of $80,730, per the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (2025). On a percentage basis that’s about 6 percent more than the typical American in this role takes home before tax.

The mean, or average, Pennsylvania salary is higher still at $93,230. When the mean runs well above the median like this, it tells you the top of the field is pulling the average up. A cluster of high earners in banking, pharmaceutical, and insurance compliance lifts the mean while the typical worker stays closer to that $85,580 midpoint. The state employs about 19,810 compliance officers, a deep market that gives you room to switch employers without relocating.

One way to read the gap between Pennsylvania and the country: the state median of $85,580 lands above the national median, and the bottom of the Pennsylvania range, $49,910 at the 10th percentile, still beats minimum-wage office work by a wide margin. The 6 percent state premium isn’t enormous, but it stacks on top of a low flat state income tax, which matters more for your actual take-home than the headline gross. We work that math out in the take-home section below. For now, the takeaway is simple: a compliance officer in Pennsylvania starts from a stronger base than the typical American in the same job, and the ceiling, $130,990 at the 75th percentile and above, is competitive with most states outside the very highest-cost coastal markets.

Compliance officer salary by experience in Pennsylvania

Experience and specialization move this number more than almost anything else. A new analyst handling routine filings sits near the bottom of the range. A senior compliance manager owning regulatory risk at a regulated bank or drug maker can earn well into six figures. The BLS percentile data maps that path cleanly.

The jump from the 25th to the 75th percentile is the story here. Moving from $63,280 to $130,990 means more than doubling your pay across a career, and most of that climb comes from owning regulatory programs rather than executing tasks inside them. In Pennsylvania the BLS data tops out at the 75th percentile and the 90th percentile at the same $130,990 figure, which means the published range caps there. In practice, compliance directors and chief compliance officers at large Philadelphia banks and Pittsburgh health systems can earn above that ceiling, but those figures fall outside what the survey reports, so treat $130,990 as the documented top.

The early-career band, roughly $49,910 to $63,280, is where most people start. Getting out of it quickly comes down to two things: picking a regulated, high-stakes industry, and earning a recognized credential before your peers do. We cover both below.

It helps to translate these percentiles into hourly terms, since many compliance jobs post a wage band rather than a salary. The median $85,580 works out to $41.15 an hour. The 25th-percentile figure of $63,280 is about $30.42 an hour, and the experienced $130,990 mark is roughly $62.98 an hour. So the documented range for the role in Pennsylvania runs from about $30 to about $63 an hour, with the typical worker right in the low $40s. If a recruiter quotes you a band that tops out below $30, you’re being offered entry-level money regardless of the title on the posting.

One more thing the percentiles reveal: the distance between the median and the 75th percentile, $85,580 to $130,990, is wider than the distance between the 10th and the median. That shape is common in regulated professions, where moving into senior, accountable program ownership delivers a step change in pay rather than a gradual slope. Plan your moves with that in mind. The raises that matter come from changing the scope of what you own, not from waiting out annual cost-of-living bumps.

Compliance officer salary by metro area

Where you work inside Pennsylvania matters as much as your title. The Philadelphia corridor, anchored by banking, insurance, and pharma, pays the most. Smaller markets in the northeast pay noticeably less. Here are the five largest metro markets for the role, ranked by median pay.

Philadelphia leads on both pay and volume. Its median of $83,000 is close to the statewide figure, and with 8,370 compliance officers it holds far more of these jobs than any other Pennsylvania market. That density matters: it means more employers competing for talent, more lateral moves available, and more room to negotiate when you change jobs.

Harrisburg is the quiet surprise at $76,940. As the state capital it concentrates government, insurance, and regulatory work, which keeps demand steady. Pittsburgh, despite being the second-largest job market with 2,730 roles, posts a lower median of $70,560, reflecting a different industry mix weighted toward health systems and manufacturing rather than high-paying financial compliance. Scranton-Wilkes-Barre, at $65,780, sits at the bottom of the five, though a lower cost of living there offsets part of that gap. The spread between Philadelphia and Scranton is about $17,220, a real difference worth weighing if you can work remotely or are open to relocating.

The metro medians sit a little below the statewide $85,580 figure, and that’s worth understanding rather than glossing over. Statewide numbers include the highest-paying employers and the full top tail of the distribution, while metro medians reflect the middle of each local market. Philadelphia at $83,000 is the closest to the state median, which tracks with it being the largest and best-paying market. The point for a job seeker is that the metro table tells you what a typical role pays in each city, while the statewide percentile table in the section above tells you how high the role can climb. Read them together. A mid-career professional in Harrisburg making the local $76,940 median has clear headroom toward the $130,990 experienced tier if they specialize and take on program ownership.

Cost of living swings the real value of these numbers too. The $65,780 Scranton median goes further on housing than the $83,000 Philadelphia median does in Center City. If you’re comparing two offers across Pennsylvania metros, convert each to take-home and then subtract a realistic local rent or mortgage before you decide. A higher gross in a pricier metro can leave you with less spendable income than a lower gross in a cheaper one.

Take-home pay after taxes in Pennsylvania

Gross salary is only half the picture. Pennsylvania levies a flat state income tax of 3.07 percent, which is simpler and, for higher earners, kinder than the graduated brackets in many states. Here’s what compliance officers actually keep at four points along the BLS range, after federal income tax, FICA (Social Security and Medicare), and Pennsylvania state tax, for the 2026 tax year. Figures assume a single filer with the standard deduction and don’t include local earned-income taxes, which vary by municipality.

At the median, a Pennsylvania compliance officer keeps about $65,964 of an $85,580 salary, an effective combined tax rate near 22.9 percent. That works out to roughly $5,497 a month in your account, or about $2,537 every two weeks. The state’s flat rate means you don’t get pushed into a higher state bracket as you climb, so more of each raise stays with you, an advantage that grows as you move toward the $130,990 experienced figure.

Notice how the effective tax rate moves up the ladder. An entry-level worker at $49,910 pays a combined effective rate near 18.6 percent and keeps $40,609. At the median the rate rises to about 22.9 percent, and at the experienced $130,990 level it reaches roughly 26.5 percent, leaving $96,263 net. That climb is driven almost entirely by the federal progressive brackets, since FICA caps on the Social Security portion and Pennsylvania’s state rate stays flat the whole way. In practical terms, the federal government takes a bigger bite of each additional dollar you earn, while the state’s share stays proportional. That’s a quietly meaningful feature for high earners, and it’s part of why senior compliance pay holds up well after tax in Pennsylvania.

Pennsylvania versus a no-tax state. Compare that median take-home against Texas, which charges no state income tax. The same $85,580 salary nets about $65,964 in Pennsylvania but about $68,592 in Texas. That’s a gap of exactly $2,628 a year in Texas’s favor, entirely the cost of Pennsylvania’s 3.07 percent income tax. It’s a real difference, but a modest one. Pennsylvania’s flat rate is one of the lowest among states that tax wages, so the penalty for staying is small compared with high-tax states like California or New York, where the same income would lose far more.

The number that actually decides your standard of living is net pay minus local housing. A $2,628 tax saving in Texas evaporates fast if you trade a $1,400 Scranton rent for a $2,200 Austin one. Run the full picture before you assume a no-tax state leaves you ahead, and confirm your own withholding with the Pennsylvania paycheck calculator. When tax season comes, software like TurboTax can handle the multi-state and local-tax wrinkles that trip up compliance professionals who relocate mid-year.

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How to earn more as a compliance officer in Pennsylvania

The path from the $63,280 early-career band to the $130,990 experienced tier is well worn. A few moves do most of the work:

• Get a recognized credential. The Certified Regulatory Compliance Manager (CRCM), Certified Compliance & Ethics Professional (CCEP), and Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialist (CAMS) are the credentials Pennsylvania employers in banking and pharma ask for by name. They’re the clearest signal you can move from executing controls to owning programs. Self-paced prep through platforms like Coursera can cover the regulatory and risk-management foundations before you sit the exam.
• Specialize in a regulated, high-stakes industry. The pay difference between general corporate compliance and a regulated bank, insurer, or drug maker is large. Philadelphia’s financial and pharmaceutical sectors, and the insurance cluster around Harrisburg, are where the top of the $130,990 range actually lives.
• Move toward AML, BSA, or healthcare regulatory work. Anti-money-laundering and Bank Secrecy Act roles, plus FDA and HIPAA compliance in Pennsylvania’s large health systems, carry a premium because the regulatory exposure is severe and the talent pool is thin.
• Target the Philadelphia market. With 8,370 roles and a $83,000 median, it offers the most room to job-hop your way up. Each external move is typically worth more than an internal raise.
• Step into management. The biggest single jump in this field is from individual contributor to compliance manager or director, the move that carries you past the median and toward the top quartile.

Job outlook for compliance officers in Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania currently employs about 19,810 compliance officers, per the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (2025), one of the larger state markets in the country. Demand is anchored by industries that aren’t going anywhere: banking and insurance in the Philadelphia and Harrisburg corridors, pharmaceuticals across the southeast, and health systems statewide. Tightening regulation in financial services and healthcare keeps the pipeline of work steady regardless of the broader economy.

That breadth is good news if you’re job hunting. A deep market means you can change employers without leaving the state, and the concentration in Philadelphia gives early-career professionals a clear place to build a track record. To see what’s live right now, browse current compliance openings on ZipRecruiter and filter by metro to match the pay bands above.

The distribution of the 19,810 jobs across metros also tells you where the action is. Philadelphia alone holds 8,370 of them, more than the next four metros combined. Pittsburgh follows with 2,730, then Harrisburg with 1,330, Allentown with 620, and Scranton-Wilkes-Barre with 570. If you want the widest selection of openings and the most negotiating room, the southeast corner of the state is where to base yourself. If you’d rather trade volume for a lower cost of living, the smaller markets still carry steady regulatory demand, just fewer competing employers at any given moment.

Keep one practical detail in mind when you read job postings. Many compliance roles in Pennsylvania are remote or hybrid for employers headquartered out of state, which means a Pittsburgh-based candidate can sometimes capture Philadelphia or even out-of-state pay without moving. When that’s on the table, the metro medians above become a floor rather than a ceiling. Always ask whether a posted salary band is tied to the office location or the employer’s national pay scale, because the answer can be worth thousands of dollars a year.

Related and higher-paying roles in Pennsylvania

If you have the analytical and regulatory skill set of a compliance officer, a couple of adjacent roles in Pennsylvania pay more. Both build on overlapping skills, so they’re realistic next steps rather than full career changes.

A management analyst in Pennsylvania earns a median of $93,830, which is $8,250 more than a compliance officer in the state. A project management specialist earns a median of $100,150, or $14,570 more than a compliance officer here. The compliance background, process discipline, risk awareness, and stakeholder management, transfers directly into both.

Frequently asked questions

Sources: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) 2025; federal and Pennsylvania tax tables, 2026 tax year. Last updated 2026. See our methodology.