Critical care residents ranked number one in salary ($62,000) in 2015, earning more than their internal medicine and family medicine colleagues, who earned the least ($53,000). Their rankings remain unchanged from 2014. Of note, the three top-paying resident specialties are only in the middle of the pack of salaries for established physicians, according to Medscape's Physician Compensation Report 2015. The average resident earned $52,000 in the first year, with salaries increasing to a high of $66,000 by the seventh year. The largest increase was between year 6 and year 7. Residents in the Northeast took home the top salaries in 2015 report, averaging $62,000; in 2014, they earned $61,000, which placed them second. Residents in the Northwest ranked number two in earnings this year, averaging $57,000; however, in 2014, they placed first. Residents in the Southeast earned the least this year and last year ($51,000 and $50,000, respectively), but this bears little relation to their future earning potential. In 2015 Physician Compensation Report, practicing physicians in the Northwest were the highest earners but their colleagues in the Northeast ranked last, and those in the Great Lakes, North Central, South Central, and Southeast regions were in a neck-and-neck race (within $3000 of each other) for the third-highest compensation. Source
