What Should I Pay My Dental Assistant?

With the current employment landscape leaning in the direction of the employees we have seen an increase in pay rates across all positions in the dental field.  

We did some research from our site to give you a breakdown of what each Dental Position is currently making in the various regions of California.

Registered Dental Hygienist:

Average hourly wage of a dental hygienist is around $50/hr*.

Major cities like Los Angeles and San Francisco are seeing an average wage of $57/hr.

*Please note, this is based on an average of a hygienist working 24 hours a week.  

 Registered Dental Assistants:

Average hourly wage of Registered Dental Assistant (RDA) is $23/hr.   

Major Cities are paying an average of $26/hr.

Dental Assistants:

The hourly wage for Dental Assistants averages around $16/hr.

Major cities are paying around $19/hr.

Front Office Personnel:

Averages around $21/hr.

Office Managers:

Averages around $25/hr.

Major cities pay around $30/hr.

There are several factors of your job that could increase or decrease how much you should be paying. 

If you offer a TOTAL COMPENSATION PACKAGE that includes Healthcare, Vision, and Paid-Time-Off with guaranteed hours and/or live in an area where there are a surplus of candidates you can offer lower pay.  

If your practice is in an area that is very expensive to live, forcing your employees to make a longer commute, you will need to offer higher pay and a fantastic work environment to find and keep employees.

Hope this serves as a reference should you be unsure of what to pay your employees.

If you need help finding Dental Assistants, read this post.