Medical Assistant Salary in Missouri 2026,
$40,440 Median | BLS Data by City

Missouri medical assistants earn a median $40,440 a year, $19.44 an hour, per BLS OEWS May 2025, with the middle half between $37,380 and $46,600 and a full range of $35,810 to $48,360. That is 11.5% below the $45,690 national median, among the lowest state figures in the country.

Kansas City at $45,300, then St. Louis at $44,710, Columbia at $41,350, St. Joseph at $40,280 and Jefferson City at $38,260. The seven thousand dollar spread is large for this occupation, and the two big metros are effectively a separate market from the rest of Missouri.

No. Missouri issues no licence, registration or certification for medical assistants and the title is not protected, so a practice may train someone into the role. What governs the work is delegation under the supervising practitioner's authority, within the Board of Registration for the Healing Arts' framework. Employers screen on AAMA or NHA certification instead.

As a way into a health system, yes; as a wage, it is one of the weakest in the country. The ninetieth percentile of $48,360 only just clears what the typical American medical assistant earns, and the twenty-fifth percentile of $37,380 is barely above entry. Missouri's low cost of living helps, and the metro health systems offer tuition assistance toward licensed credentials — which is the most valuable thing about the role here.

Missouri's graduated income tax tops out at 4.8%, gentle at this income. Kansas City and St. Louis each levy a 1% earnings tax on anyone working inside the city, charged flat regardless of income — proportionally heaviest at exactly this salary, and it applies to the only two Missouri markets paying near the national median for this role.

Low cost of living sets a low floor and nothing pushes it up. Missouri's housing and general costs are among the lowest in this batch, so employers clear the market at a lower nominal wage; there is no state credential creating a higher-paid tier; the health systems run standardised grids across their acquired practices; and a location quotient of 0.85 does not indicate scarcity so much as a staffing model that uses fewer of these workers. The result is a $40,440 median with a ceiling that barely reaches the national midpoint.

It assumes full-time hours in an occupation where part-time schedules are common in physician practices, and it is a gross figure before the city earnings tax that applies in the two best-paying markets. It should also be read alongside Missouri's cost of living, which is genuinely low — $40,440 in Springfield or Jefferson City is not the same proposition as $40,440 in a coastal state. That mitigates the figure without changing what it says about the ladder.

Into licensed clinical practice, and the metro systems will help. BJC, Mercy, SSM, Saint Luke's and the University of Missouri systems all offer tuition assistance toward practical nursing, registered nursing, imaging and surgical technology, and Missouri's community college network is an affordable pipeline into those credentials. Within the occupation the honest answer is that the ceiling of $48,360 arrives quickly and getting into a Kansas City or St. Louis system is the only substantial move available before then.