Home › Psychiatrist › Salary

Psychiatrist salary in Australia

The median full-time salary for a psychiatrist is $148,200 per annum, before tax, up $30,900 since 2018.

• What you earn as a psychiatrist comes down to how you bill and who employs you.
• Public hospital pay follows state enterprise agreements and adds loadings for on-call, weekends and after-hours work, while private practice income rises and falls with your fees, Medicare rebates and how many patients you see each week.
• Ask how the on-call roster is paid and whether the figure quoted is full time, because a part-time private practice and a full public appointment are not comparable week to week.

How to negotiate a higher psychiatrist salary

• Know the market rate before you ask. The median full-time psychiatrist salary is $148,200; use that, not a guess, as your anchor, and adjust for your experience and employer.
• Use demand as leverage. Psychiatrists are on the national skills shortage list, so employers are more likely to move on price to keep or attract someone in a role they're struggling to fill.
• Lead with what's scarce, not just tenure. Skills like Clinical assessment and treatment and Medication management tend to command a premium over general psychiatrist experience, name them specifically when you ask.
• Time it deliberately. Reviews, the end of a project you delivered, or taking on responsibility beyond your job description are stronger moments to ask than an arbitrary date on the calendar.
• Ask for a number, not a raise. "Based on the market rate and [specific contribution], I'd like to move to X" gets a clearer answer than "I think I deserve more."

Psychiatrist salary questions

Related salaries

• General Practitioner salary
• Resident Medical Officer salary
• Nurse Practitioner salary
• Osteopath salary
• Surgeon salary
• Rheumatologist salary