Compensation Trends for April 2026

The National Compensation Forecast white paper is designed to capture salary changes across a broad range of jobs found in the United States economy. This index shows how national compensation has changed over the 20 years prior to the time of publication: April 2026.

INTRODUCTION
Each quarter, ERI examines the rates at which compensation has increased and provides guidance on expected increases for the upcoming year. These rates are calculated using ERI’s Salary Assessor and ERI’s Salary Increase Survey & Forecast. In the context of this paper, the results represent actual growth reported in ERI’s Salary Assessor over periods ranging from one quarter to twenty years.

OVERALL TRENDS IN COMPENSATION
April salary growth (0.60%) is up from the January 1 data release (0.42%), but lower than the predicted quarterly rate of 0.69%. Growth over the past year has been 2.06%, with an average quarterly growth of 0.52%.

10-YEAR TRENDS BY CATEGORY
While it is valuable to know how all occupations are moving in this economy, it is also useful to know how different types of occupations move relative to each other and across time. Not all occupations grow at the same rate, and not all occupations grow at the same rate across time.