Institutional Base Salary (IBS)

Examples

Worked examples

Is an instance
A faculty member's institution sets their IBS at $180,000/year for a 12-month appointment covering teaching, clinical, and research duties. They commit 25 percent effort to an NIH R01. The salary requested from that grant is 25 percent of $180,000 ($45,000) -- IBS is below the NIH salary cap, so the full requested amount is allowable.
Is an instance
A researcher's IBS is $210,000. Because that figure is below the FY2026 NIH salary cap of $228,000, IBS -- not the cap -- is the binding number: their grant-charged salary is calculated as their committed effort percentage multiplied by the full $210,000 IBS, with no reduction required.
Is an instance
An institution documents in its written policy that IBS for a given position equals the individual's negotiated annual salary under their standard appointment letter, excluding a separately-tracked stipend the same person receives for an unrelated part-time administrative role -- illustrating that IBS is tied to a specific appointment, not to every dollar an individual is paid by the institution in any capacity.

Counter-examples

Looks similar, but isn't

Not an instance
Treating IBS and the NIH salary cap as the same thing is incorrect -- IBS is the institution's own determination of what it pays someone for their appointment; the salary cap is a separate, externally-imposed ceiling (Executive Level II, $228,000 effective January 1, 2026) on the rate at which federal funds may reimburse against that IBS. A person can have an IBS entirely unaffected by the cap (if their IBS is below it) or constrained by it (if their IBS exceeds it) -- the cap does not define or change what IBS is.
Not an instance
Including outside consulting income, honoraria, or a one-time bonus when calculating IBS is incorrect per NIH Grants Policy Statement guidance -- these fall outside the definition of base salary paid by the institution for the appointment, and inflating IBS with them would overstate the salary base used for effort-cost calculations.
Not an instance
Assuming IBS is a fixed, federally-published figure like the salary cap is incorrect -- IBS varies institution to institution and even appointment to appointment; there is no NIH schedule or formula for it. Each institution sets and documents its own IBS determination for each individual.

Editorial commentary

Institutional Base Salary (IBS) is the annual compensation an institution pays a faculty or staff member for the professional effort covered by their appointment — research, teaching, clinical, administrative, or any combination — regardless of how many different funding sources end up paying portions of it. IBS is set entirely by the institution itself; there is no federal formula or published schedule for it, unlike the dollar figures federal sponsors publish for things like the NIH Salary Cap. Once an institution has determined a person’s IBS, that figure becomes the base against which sponsors expect effort-based salary charges — and, where one applies, a salary cap — to be calculated.

The operational definition, per NIH guidance

The NIH Grants Policy Statement (Section 12.8.1, Salaries and Fringe Benefits) defines institutional base salary as the annual compensation the organization pays for an employee’s appointment, whether that individual’s time is spent on research, teaching, patient care, or other activities. Two exclusions in that same guidance matter for anyone calculating it: IBS excludes any income an individual is permitted to earn outside their duties to the institution (for example, outside consulting fees, honoraria, or board compensation), and it excludes discretionary items such as bonuses or incentive pay that are not a fixed, ongoing part of the base appointment. NIH guidance also specifies that base salary may not be increased as a result of replacing institutional salary funds with grant funds — an institution cannot use the availability of federal award dollars as a reason to raise someone’s underlying IBS.

What IBS includes and excludes

Included: the fixed annual salary the institution has committed to pay for the appointment itself, covering the full scope of institutional duties (not just the portion later charged to any one grant).
Excluded: outside consulting income, honoraria, and other earnings permitted outside the individual’s institutional duties.
Excluded: bonuses, one-time incentive payments, and similar discretionary compensation that is not a standing part of the base appointment.
Not inflatable by grant funding: an institution cannot raise a person’s IBS simply because grant funds have become available to cover a larger share of it.

Why IBS is the denominator, not the ceiling

IBS and the NIH Salary Cap are two distinct concepts that get confused constantly in grants administration because they interact in the same calculation, but they answer different questions:

IBS answers: “What does this institution actually pay this person for their appointment?” It is an institutional determination, specific to the individual and their appointment, with no external ceiling of its own.
The NIH Salary Cap answers: “What is the maximum rate, set by Congress and tied to Executive Level II of the federal pay scale, at which NIH funds may reimburse salary?” It is a single, published, government-wide figure (currently $228,000, effective January 1, 2026) that applies uniformly across NIH awards, unrelated to any one institution’s pay structure.

In an effort-based salary calculation, IBS is always the starting point: the requested salary equals the person’s percentage of effort on the project multiplied by their IBS. The salary cap only becomes relevant as a second step, and only when IBS exceeds the cap — in that case, the calculation switches to using the capped rate instead of the full IBS for the percentage above the cap. When IBS is at or below the cap, the cap simply never enters the calculation; IBS alone determines the requested salary. See CASRAI’s NIH Salary Cap entry for how that second step works in detail, including how any excess above the cap must be funded.

How IBS is used in practice

Effort-based salary requests. When a proposal budget requests salary support for a percentage of a researcher’s effort, that percentage is applied to IBS (or the capped rate, if IBS exceeds the applicable cap) to produce the dollar figure requested. This is the core arithmetic behind nearly every personnel line in a federal grant budget — see CASRAI’s entry on personnel cost (grant) for the broader cost category IBS-based salary requests sit within.
Effort reporting and certification. Effort reporting tracks and certifies the percentage of a person’s total professional effort (against their full IBS-covered appointment) devoted to each funded activity. Because IBS represents the full appointment, effort percentages across all activities — funded and unfunded — should sum to the individual’s total committed effort. CASRAI’s guide to effort reporting methodologies covers how institutions track and certify this.
Career Development (K) Award budgeting. For NIH Career Development Awards, the salary requested is explicitly based on the investigator’s IBS prorated for their percentage commitment to the award — making an accurate, well-documented IBS determination especially consequential for K-award budgets.
Cost-sharing distinctions. The salary difference that arises when IBS exceeds a federal salary cap is not, on its own, a cost-sharing commitment, and institutions must not double-count it toward a separate cost-share obligation. See CASRAI’s entry on cost share (mandatory) for how mandatory cost-sharing is properly documented.

Worked example

An institution determines a principal investigator’s IBS is $180,000 for a 12-month appointment. The PI commits 25 percent effort to an NIH R01. Because $180,000 is below the FY2026 NIH salary cap of $228,000, the calculation uses IBS directly: 25 percent of $180,000 is $45,000, and that is the full amount the grant can request for the PI’s salary. If the same PI’s IBS were instead $260,000 — above the cap — the calculation would switch at the point IBS crosses the cap: 25 percent of the capped $228,000 ($57,000) is the maximum NIH can reimburse, and the remaining salary attributable to that 25 percent of a $260,000 IBS ($65,000) minus the $57,000 NIH can pay, or $8,000, would need to come from a non-federal source, with the PI’s committed effort remaining 25 percent regardless of which source funds it.

Counter-example

An institution counts a faculty member’s outside consulting income and an end-of-year performance bonus toward their IBS when calculating a grant salary request. This is not a correct application of the NIH definition — both outside consulting income and discretionary bonus pay are explicitly excluded from institutional base salary under NIH Grants Policy Statement guidance, and including them would overstate the base used for the effort calculation.

References

NIH Grants Policy Statement, Section 12.8.1, “Salaries and Fringe Benefits,” grants.nih.gov/grants/policy/nihgps
CASRAI dictionary entry, NIH Salary Cap

Machine-readable encodings

Use in your systems

JATS XML <role> element

xml

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Schema.org DefinedTerm (JSON-LD)

json

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