The association between physician salary and competitiveness of that specialty in the match: money still matters.

Abstract

Given high levels of student debt and a desire for high income, we hypothesize that the mean salary of a medical specialty is correlated with how desirable that specialty is for graduating US medical students. We used salary data from a 2024 survey of 33,000 US physicians. As a proxy for desirability or competitiveness, we used the percentage of year 1 positions filled with US allopathic seniors based on data from the National Residency Match Program. Scatter plots were created and Pearson correlation coefficients were calculated. There was a strong positive correlation between salary and competitiveness for US allopathic seniors (r = + 0.65). A negative correlation was seen for US osteopathic seniors (r = -0.53) and international medical graduates (r = -0.58). A specialty's salary is strongly associated with its competitiveness for US allopathic seniors. Data for osteopathic seniors and international graduates shows the opposite association, suggesting a channeling bias of these students into lower-paying specialties or more successful efforts to encourage primary care careers.