Physician Assistant Salary in Pennsylvania: Pay by Experience, City & Take-Home

A physician assistant in Pennsylvania earns a median of $127,070 a year, which works out to about $61.09 an hour, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (2025). Most PAs in the state land between $99,050 at the 10th percentile and $158,690 at the 90th percentile. That puts the typical Pennsylvania PA a bit below the national median, but the state’s flat income tax keeps more of each paycheck than many higher-cost states.

How Pennsylvania compares to the national median

The national median for physician assistants is $135,880 a year, per the BLS (2025). Pennsylvania’s median of $127,070 sits $8,810 below that, a gap of roughly 6.5%. So a PA who relocates from a higher-paying market to Pennsylvania should expect a slightly lower headline number on the offer letter.

That gap shrinks once you look at what the money buys. Pennsylvania levies a single flat income tax of 3.07% rather than the graduated brackets you see in states like New York or California, and housing across most of the state runs cheaper than the coastal markets that prop up the national average. A $127,070 salary in Harrisburg or Lancaster stretches further than a higher figure in San Francisco or Boston. The state employs about 9,020 physician assistants, so this is a deep, established market with steady demand across hospital systems, urgent care, and specialty practices.

The other thing worth saying plainly: the national median is pulled up by a handful of very high-cost, high-pay states. Pennsylvania’s range, $99,050 to $158,690, is wide enough that an experienced PA in the right specialty and metro can clear the national median comfortably while still living somewhere affordable. The headline gap is real, but it is not the whole story.

Put the two medians side by side and the math is simple. The national figure of $135,880 beats Pennsylvania’s $127,070 by $8,810. Yet Pennsylvania’s own 90th percentile of $158,690 sits $22,810 above the national median, and its 75th percentile of $137,220 already edges past it by $1,340. In other words, the state’s top half of earners is not capped by the statewide median at all. A PA who builds toward the upper percentiles in Pennsylvania out-earns the typical PA nationwide while paying a flat 3.07% state tax instead of graduated brackets. The mean salary of $125,160 sitting just below the $127,070 median also tells you the distribution is fairly balanced, without a thin tail of outliers dragging the average down.

Physician assistant pay by experience in Pennsylvania

Experience, specialty, and the willingness to take call all move PA pay inside the state. The percentile spread from BLS (2025) is the cleanest proxy for that progression, since newer PAs cluster near the 10th and 25th percentiles and seasoned PAs in surgical or emergency specialties sit near the 90th.

The jump from entry to median is large, about $28,020, which reflects how much faster PA pay climbs in the first several years than it does later. A new graduate starting near $99,050 can reasonably expect to reach the $127,070 median within a handful of years simply by accruing experience and moving into a better-paying specialty. The climb from the 75th to the 90th percentile, by contrast, is $21,470 and usually requires something extra: a high-acuity specialty like surgery, cardiology, or emergency medicine, leadership responsibilities, or heavy call coverage.

Specialty is the single biggest lever inside any given experience band. Two PAs with identical years of service can sit on opposite ends of this table depending on whether they work in primary care or in a procedural specialty. If your goal is the 90th-percentile number, the path almost always runs through a surgical, emergency, or subspecialty role rather than through tenure alone.

It helps to read the spread as four distinct gaps. From the 10th to the 25th percentile is $8,210, the early grind of a new PA proving out in a first role. From the 25th to the median is $19,810, the largest jump on the table and the one that rewards getting board-experienced and choosing a paying specialty. From the median to the 75th is $10,150, often unlocked by call coverage, productivity bonuses, or a move to a higher-paying metro. And from the 75th to the 90th is $21,470, the steepest single step, reserved for senior PAs in high-acuity surgical or emergency settings with leadership scope. Knowing which gap you are standing in tells you whether your next raise comes from tenure, specialty, geography, or all three.

Hourly framing makes the same point for anyone weighing per-diem or locum work. The median $61.09 an hour climbs to roughly $76.29 at the 90th percentile and starts near $47.62 at entry. A per-diem PA picking up extra shifts is effectively pricing their time against that $61.09 baseline, so any locum or moonlighting rate below it is a pay cut, and anything north of it is moving you up the curve faster than a salaried role would.

Physician assistant salary by metro in Pennsylvania

Where you work inside Pennsylvania matters as much as your specialty. The Philadelphia metro pays the most and concentrates the largest share of jobs, while the central and southeastern metros pay a touch less but pair that with lower housing costs. Here are the five largest PA metros by physician assistant employment, per BLS (2025).

Philadelphia leads at $135,640, which is $8,570 above the statewide median and actually edges past the national median of $135,880 only just below it. That premium tracks the region’s dense network of academic medical centers and large hospital systems. With 3,390 PAs employed, Philadelphia alone accounts for more than a third of the state’s physician assistant workforce.

Pittsburgh, the second-largest market at 2,560 jobs, pays a median of $125,230, close to the statewide figure. Allentown-Bethlehem-Easton is the quiet standout: at $129,680 it pays more than Pittsburgh while sitting in a lower-cost corridor, which can make it one of the better value markets in the state for a PA optimizing for take-home after housing. Lancaster ($124,070) and Harrisburg-Carlisle ($123,110) round out the list with medians within a few thousand dollars of each other, both paired with central-Pennsylvania housing costs that are well below Philadelphia’s.

The practical read: Philadelphia for the highest gross, Allentown for the best balance of pay and cost, and the central metros if you want a solid median salary against cheaper rent and mortgages.

The spread between the top and bottom metro is worth quantifying. Philadelphia’s $135,640 is $12,530 more than Harrisburg-Carlisle’s $123,110, the lowest of the five. That is close to a 10% swing on pay just from moving across the state, before you account for any difference in cost of living. For a PA who is location-flexible, that gap is real money: $12,530 a year compounds into more than $125,000 over a decade, and it lands on top of whatever specialty premium you already command.

Employment concentration tells its own story. Philadelphia (3,390) and Pittsburgh (2,560) together hold 5,950 of the state’s 9,020 PA jobs, about two-thirds of the entire market. The remaining metros are smaller but not thin: Harrisburg-Carlisle (580), Allentown (560), and Lancaster (340) each support hundreds of positions. The smaller central markets can actually be easier places to negotiate, because a single large hospital system often anchors hiring and competes hard for experienced PAs against a shallower local talent pool. If you are early in your search and want volume of listings, the two big metros win. If you want bargaining power and a lower cost of living, Allentown and the central corridor reward a closer look.

Take-home pay after taxes in Pennsylvania

Gross salary is the number on the offer. Net pay is the number that hits your account. Pennsylvania’s flat 3.07% income tax keeps the state bite small and predictable, so most of the variation in your effective rate comes from federal brackets and FICA. The table below runs the four key percentile points through federal tax, FICA, and Pennsylvania state tax for a single filer, per ThePayGuide tax modeling (2026).

At the median, a Pennsylvania PA keeps $93,704 of a $127,070 salary, an effective all-in rate of 26.3%. That means roughly $7,809 a month after federal tax, FICA, and state tax. Notice how little the state line moves: even at the senior level, Pennsylvania takes $4,872, a small slice next to the $27,333 federal bill. The flat tax is the reason your effective rate climbs so gently across the table, from 24.3% at entry to 27.9% at senior.

Walk the table top to bottom and the progression is clear. At entry, $99,050 gross becomes $75,027 net, about $6,252 a month. At the experienced 75th percentile, $137,220 nets $100,330, the point where annual take-home crosses into six figures, or roughly $8,361 a month. At the senior 90th percentile, $158,690 nets $114,346, about $9,529 a month. So the full climb from entry to senior adds $59,640 in gross but $39,319 in net, which is the practical reminder that higher brackets keep a larger cut of each additional dollar. The marginal step from experienced to senior, $21,470 in gross, delivers $14,016 in extra take-home, about 65 cents on the dollar.

FICA is the line most people forget to plan around. It runs from $7,577 at entry to $12,140 at senior and is essentially fixed by law, not something Pennsylvania or your employer can adjust. Pairing it with the flat state tax means your only real lever on the effective rate is the federal side, which is where retirement contributions, an HSA, and pre-tax benefits do their work. A PA maxing pre-tax accounts can shave the federal line meaningfully while the FICA and state lines stay put.

How Pennsylvania compares on net pay: here is the most useful cross-state number on this page. Take the Pennsylvania median PA salary of $127,070. In Pennsylvania, the net take-home is $93,704. The exact same gross in Texas, a state with no income tax at all, nets $97,605. That is a gap of $3,901 a year, the full amount of Pennsylvania’s flat state tax at this income. So a PA weighing an identical offer in Texas versus Pennsylvania would keep $3,901 more per year in Texas, purely on the tax difference.

But that comparison only matters once you subtract local housing. Net pay minus what you spend on rent or a mortgage is the number that actually determines your standard of living. A $3,901 tax advantage in a higher-cost housing market can evaporate against cheaper housing in central Pennsylvania, and the reverse is true too. Run your own salary, filing status, and zip code through the Pennsylvania paycheck calculator before you treat any of these figures as final, and if you want your withholding dialed in or your return handled cleanly, TurboTax walks you through the state and federal pieces together.

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How to earn more as a PA in Pennsylvania

The percentile table shows the ceiling is high, $158,690 at the 90th, so the question is how to move up it. These are the levers that actually shift PA pay in this state.

• Move into a procedural or surgical specialty. The widest gap inside any experience band comes from specialty. Surgical, cardiology, emergency, and orthopedic PAs sit toward the 75th and 90th percentiles. Primary care and outpatient roles cluster lower. Switching specialties is the fastest single way to add five figures.
• Target the Philadelphia or Allentown metros. Philadelphia’s $135,640 median is $8,570 above the statewide figure, and Allentown’s $129,680 beats Pittsburgh while costing less to live in. Geography alone can be worth several thousand dollars a year.
• Take call and cover high-acuity shifts. Call pay, night and weekend differentials, and overtime stack on top of base. In hospital settings these can add meaningfully to total compensation without a job change.
• Add credentials in a high-demand area. Certificates in areas like emergency medicine, dermatology, or surgical first-assist make you eligible for the better-paying postings. Structured coursework through a platform like Coursera can shore up the didactic side before you pursue a clinical certificate.
• Negotiate on total package, not just base. Sign-on bonuses, CME allowances, loan repayment, and productivity bonuses are common in Pennsylvania hospital systems. A lower base with strong RVU-based productivity pay can out-earn a higher flat salary.
• Build tenure where it compounds. The climb from entry ($99,050) to median ($127,070) is steep and largely automatic with experience. Staying in a system that promotes from within captures that $28,020 jump faster than job-hopping into lateral roles.

Job outlook for PAs in Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania employs about 9,020 physician assistants, per BLS (2025), one of the larger PA workforces in the country. Demand is anchored by the state’s major hospital systems in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, a growing urgent-care footprint, and an aging population that leans heavily on the kind of care PAs deliver. Physician assistant is among the faster-growing health roles nationally, and Pennsylvania’s deep base of academic medical centers and community hospitals keeps openings steady across both metros and smaller markets.

The practical takeaway for someone entering or relocating: with 3,390 jobs in Philadelphia and 2,560 in Pittsburgh, the two big metros offer the most listings and the most room to specialize, while central markets like Harrisburg and Lancaster offer steady demand against lower living costs. To see what’s actually posting near you and at what pay, scan current openings on ZipRecruiter.

Related and higher-paying roles in Pennsylvania

If you’re weighing the PA path against neighboring clinical roles, here is how the median pay compares in Pennsylvania, using BLS (2025) figures. A nurse practitioner in Pennsylvania earns a median of $130,140, which is $3,070 more than the PA median of $127,070. A registered nurse earns $96,430, which is $30,640 less than a PA. So the PA role sits just below NP pay and well above RN pay in this state.

Frequently asked questions

Sources: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, OEWS 2025 (occupation, state, and metro wages and employment); ThePayGuide 2026 tax modeling (federal, FICA, and Pennsylvania state withholding). Last updated 2026. See our methodology.