Minnesota Raises Workers' Comp Permanent Partial Disability Pay

Minnesota Raises Workers' Comp Permanent Partial Disability Payouts Today

Minnesota's permanent partial disability schedule goes up today. Under 2026 Minnesota Session Laws, Chapter 103, section 10, every dollar figure in Minnesota Statutes section 176.101, subdivision 2a rises by about 20 percent, but only for dates of injury on or after October 1, 2026.

Information last verified on October 1, 2026.

Status: S.F. 3720 passed the Senate 65 to 0 on May 11, 2026 and the House 132 to 1 on May 14, 2026, was presented to the Governor on May 15, 2026, and was signed on May 18, 2026 at 4:17 p.m. as Chapter 103. Sections 8, 10 and 12 are effective for dates of injury on or after October 1, 2026, which is today. Sections 1 through 7, 9, 11 and 13 took effect the day following final enactment.

Jurisdiction scope: This article covers the Minnesota workers' compensation act (Minnesota Statutes chapter 176) as amended by 2026 Minnesota Session Laws, Chapter 103. It does not cover federal compensation programs (FECA, the Longshore Act, the Jones Act or the Federal Employers' Liability Act), and it does not restate any other state's schedule. For other states, including neighboring Wisconsin, start from our 50-state workers' compensation hub.

What Happened

S.F. 3720 of the 94th Minnesota Legislature became 2026 Minnesota Session Laws, Chapter 103. The bill was authored by Senators McEwen and Utke with Representative Baker carrying the House companion, H.F. 4598; the House substituted the Senate file on May 12, 2026 and passed it on May 14, 2026 by a vote of 132 to 1, three days after the Senate passed it 65 to 0. The act was presented to the Governor on May 15, 2026 and signed on May 18, 2026 at 4:17 p.m.

The act runs 14 sections. Its own title describes it as "relating to workers' compensation; adopting 2026 recommendations of the Workers' Compensation Advisory Council," the statutory council of business and labor representatives that recommends amendments to chapter 176. The Department of Labor and Industry's June 2026 COMPACT newsletter describes the recommendations as unanimously approved by that council.

Three sections are keyed to today's date rather than to enactment.

Section 10 replaces the permanent partial disability schedule. Minnesota pays permanent partial disability as a flat scheduled amount rather than as a wage-replacement stream. Subdivision 2a, paragraph (b) sets out the arithmetic:

The percentage determined pursuant to the rules adopted under section 176.105 must be multiplied by the corresponding amount in the following table:

Minn. Stat. 176.101, subd. 2a, para. (b), as amended by 2026 Minn. Laws ch. 103, sec. 10.

Section 10 leaves that sentence untouched and changes only the 20 dollar figures in the table that follows it. Here is the table as the session law shows it, with the struck figures and the new ones side by side:

Those 20 rows are the complete table, transcribed from the chapter text. The act states no percentage increase; dividing each new figure by the one it replaces gives the same ratio in every row, approximately 1.2011, so the schedule rose by roughly 20.1 percent across the board rather than being reweighted toward any particular band of impairment. Section 10 carries its own effective-date clause: "This section is effective for dates of injury on or after October 1, 2026."

Section 8 widens who may diagnose PTSD. Minnesota treats post-traumatic stress disorder as a compensable "mental impairment" under the occupational-disease definition in section 176.011, subdivision 15, paragraph (d). Before today that paragraph defined mental impairment as "a diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder by a licensed psychiatrist or psychologist." Section 8 inserts a third category, so the definition now reads "by a licensed psychiatrist, psychologist, or psychiatric mental health nurse practitioner." Nothing else in paragraph (d) changed: PTSD still means the condition as described in the most recently published edition of the American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.

One discrepancy is worth flagging, because it points in two directions. The session law gives section 8 the clause "This section is effective for dates of injury on or after October 1, 2026." The Department of Labor and Industry's June 2026 COMPACT summary instead lists section 8's effective date as "the day following final enactment." We are reporting the session law, because the enacted text is the law and the newsletter says of itself that it "provides only a summary" and directs readers to the actual language of Chapter 103.

Section 12 extends a liability-reversal window. Under section 176.221, subdivision 1, an employer or insurer that has started paying temporary total compensation and then decides the disability is not the result of a personal injury may terminate payment by filing a notice of denial of liability. The deadline for doing so moves from 60 days to 90 days from notice to or knowledge of the injury. After the 90 days, payment "may be terminated only by the filing of a notice as provided under section 176.239." Section 12 also carries the October 1, 2026 date-of-injury clause.

Section 9 is a correction, not an increase. The brief version circulating in trade summaries, that Chapter 103 raised the employee attorney fee cap to 20 percent of the first $275,000 with a $55,000 maximum, is not what the chapter did. That increase was enacted two years earlier. Laws 2024, chapter 97, section 4 amended section 176.081, subdivision 1 to read "20 percent of the first $275,000," raised the cumulative ceiling in paragraph (b) from $26,000 to $55,000, and took effect for dates of injury on or after October 1, 2024. What the 2024 act missed was subdivision 9, the separate provision that dictates, in ten-point type, the notice an attorney must put in the retainer agreement. That notice still recited the old numbers. Section 9 of Chapter 103 fixes it:

The maximum fee allowed by law for legal services is 20 percent of the first $275,000 of compensation awarded to the employee subject to a cumulative maximum fee of $55,000 for fees related to the same injury.

Minn. Stat. 176.081, subd. 9, Notice of Maximum Fee, as amended by 2026 Minn. Laws ch. 103, sec. 9.

Because the underlying cap had already applied since October 1, 2024, section 9 was given a matching reach: "This section is effective the day following final enactment and applies to dates of injury on or after October 1, 2024." That is the retroactivity the brief summaries describe. It is real, it is in the enacted text, and it is narrow: it backdates a conforming disclosure, not a fee increase.

The balance of the act is insurance plumbing. Sections 1 through 6 rewrite the Workers' Compensation Reinsurance Association statutes in chapter 79, consolidating excess-surplus distributions and deficiency assessments into section 79.362 and adding new duties in section 79.35. Section 7 adds subdivision 4 to section 175A.05, letting the chief judge of the Workers' Compensation Court of Appeals borrow an active compensation judge from the Court of Administrative Hearings when the appeals court cannot assemble a quorum. Section 11 clarifies that the witness an employee may bring to an employer-requested examination under section 176.155 is an unpaid witness. Section 13 makes technical changes to section 176.322 on decisions from stipulated facts. Section 14 repeals section 79.34, subdivision 2a, and sections 79.361 and 79.363; it carries no effective-date clause, so the general rule in Minnesota Statutes section 645.02 applies, which puts an act without a specified date in force on August 1 following final enactment.

What the Law Actually Says

Permanent partial disability in Minnesota is not a wage-loss benefit. It compensates the permanent impairment itself, and the amount is purely arithmetic: a rating expressed as a percentage of the whole body, multiplied by the single dollar figure that the schedule assigns to the band that rating falls in.

The rating half of that equation did not change today. Section 176.105, subdivision 1 directs the commissioner of labor and industry to establish by rule a schedule of degrees of disability, requires that ratings "be based on objective medical evidence," and allows the rules to give minor impairments a zero rating. Where an injury supported by objective medical evidence is not rated at all, paragraph (c) requires that it "be assigned and compensated for at the rating for the most similar condition that is rated." The Department of Labor and Industry identifies the governing rules for injuries on or after July 1, 1993 as Minnesota Rules 5223.0300 through 5223.0650, as amended effective August 9, 2010. Those rules are untouched by Chapter 103, so a given injury produces the same percentage today as it did yesterday. Only the multiplier moved.

Two features of subdivision 2a are easy to miss and both matter to the figures.

First, the amount is fixed by the date of injury, not by when the money is paid. That was not always clear. Until 2024, paragraph (b) said the percentage was multiplied by the table amount "at the time permanent partial disability is payable according to paragraph (c)." Laws 2024, chapter 97, section 6 struck that phrase, effective the day following final enactment. What remains is the bare multiplication sentence, with each amending act's own effective-date clause doing the work of saying which table applies. Chapter 103's clause is a date-of-injury clause, so the October 1, 2026 figures attach to injuries from today forward and to nothing earlier.

Second, the ceiling is still the whole body. Subdivision 2a keeps the sentence that an employee "may not receive compensation for more than a 100 percent disability of the whole body, even if the employee sustains disability to two or more body parts." Paragraph (c) is also unchanged: permanent partial disability is payable when temporary total disability ends, a requested lump sum must be paid within 30 days and may be discounted to present value on a basis of up to five percent, and permanent partial disability is not payable while temporary total compensation is being paid.

On the fee side, one piece of context belongs with the numbers in the new notice. A note published with section 176.081 records that "the parts of section 176.081 regulating attorney fees without permitting review by the court were found unconstitutional in Irwin v. Surdyks Liquor, 599 N.W.2d 132 (Minn. 1999)." Our observation, stated separately from that note: the statutory formula therefore operates against a backdrop of judicial review rather than as a self-executing ceiling, which is why the figure in a retainer agreement is a statutory maximum and not a prediction of what any particular fee will be. Our page on how Minnesota's workers' compensation system handles benefits and disputes walks through the surrounding claim machinery.

Chapter 103 also carries forward, untouched, the review mandate in paragraph (a): during the 2026 regular session "and every even-year legislative session thereafter," the Workers' Compensation Advisory Council must consider whether the schedule in paragraph (b) represents adequate compensation for permanent impairment. The 2026 regular session is the first session that instruction names.

Analysis: Why This Matters

The following is analysis from the Recording Law Editorial Team.

The uniform ratio is the most informative thing in the table. A legislature that wanted to redirect money toward catastrophic injuries would have raised the top rows faster than the bottom ones; a legislature worried about low-rating claim volume would have done the reverse. Chapter 103 did neither. Every row moved by the same factor, which is the arithmetic signature of an across-the-board adequacy adjustment rather than a policy reweighting. That is consistent with how the increase arrived: not as a contested bill but as a council recommendation that the Department of Labor and Industry describes as unanimous, passing 65 to 0 and 132 to 1.

The date-of-injury trigger is where real disputes will land. Permanent partial disability is a late-arriving benefit: a rating comes once the impairment is permanent, and paragraph (c) makes the money payable when temporary total disability ends, so years can separate the date that fixes the dollar figure from the date the check is written. The 2024 deletion of the "at the time permanent partial disability is payable" language removed the one reading under which a later-paid claim might have reached a later table. A 2025 injury rated in 2027 is still a 2025-schedule claim.

Section 8 is small in text and not small in practice. Minnesota already treats PTSD as an occupational disease and, for a defined list of first responders and public-safety workers, presumes under paragraph (e) that a qualifying PTSD diagnosis is work-related. That presumption is gated on a diagnosis from a professional named in paragraph (d). Adding psychiatric mental health nurse practitioners widens the gate without touching the presumption or the diagnostic standard, which remains the current edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual. The section changes who may supply the diagnosis and nothing else.

The section 8 effective-date discrepancy is a live trap and not a trivia item. If the department's summary were right, a worker injured in July 2026 could rely on a nurse practitioner's diagnosis. If the session law is right, and it is the enacted text, that worker cannot, because section 8 reaches only dates of injury on or after October 1, 2026. Anyone reading the agency summary rather than the chapter could get that backwards in either direction.

Section 12 runs against the employee side of the ledger, and it should be named as such. Extending the reversal window from 60 to 90 days gives an insurer 30 more days to convert an accepted claim into a denied one on the strength of a single notice, before the more demanding discontinuance procedure in section 176.239 applies. Its date-of-injury trigger means it arrives alongside the higher permanent partial disability figures rather than ahead of them.

How This Affects You

Some general implications follow from the text, none of which is advice about a particular claim.

The date of injury is the fact to check first against any Minnesota permanent partial disability figure, including figures in older guides, agency handouts and calculators that were accurate yesterday and are not accurate for an injury dated today.

If you are looking at a PTSD claim, the identity of the diagnosing professional matters and so does the injury date. A psychiatric mental health nurse practitioner's diagnosis satisfies the definition in section 176.011, subdivision 15, paragraph (d) for dates of injury on or after October 1, 2026 under the session law's own clause.

If you have signed a retainer agreement in a Minnesota workers' compensation matter, the notice in it should now recite 20 percent of the first $275,000 and a $55,000 cumulative maximum. An agreement that still shows $130,000 and $26,000 is reciting language the Legislature replaced, for any injury on or after October 1, 2024. Our Minnesota workers' compensation overview sets out where fee disputes are heard.

What Happens Next

Two things are scheduled rather than finished.

The Workers' Compensation Advisory Council's review duty under section 176.101, subdivision 2a, paragraph (a) recurs every even-year legislative session, so the next scheduled look at whether the schedule is adequate falls in the 2028 regular session. The duty is to consider adequacy; the statute does not require a recommendation or an increase.

Administrative material also has to catch up. The Office of the Revisor of Statutes was still publishing the 2025 edition of section 176.101 with the old figures as of today, its printed amendment history ending at Laws 2024, chapter 97, and the same was true of the retainer notice in section 176.081, subdivision 9. Until the published editions turn over, the session law is the authority for the new numbers. The repealer in section 14, carrying no effective-date clause, took effect on August 1, 2026 under section 645.02.

This article is information, not legal advice. It describes 2026 Minnesota Session Laws, Chapter 103 and the statutes it amends as published by the Office of the Revisor of Statutes. It does not tell you what your claim is worth, whether you are entitled to a benefit, or what to file. Workers' compensation outcomes depend on the date of injury, the medical record and the rating rules applied to it. For advice about a specific Minnesota claim, consult a licensed Minnesota attorney or contact the Department of Labor and Industry's workers' compensation ombudsman.

Related articles

• Minnesota workers' compensation laws
• Workers' compensation laws by state

Last updated: 2026-10-01. Details verified as of 2026-10-01.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does the new Minnesota permanent partial disability schedule apply to my existing claim?

Not if you were injured before October 1, 2026. Section 10 of 2026 Minnesota Session Laws, Chapter 103 states that it 'is effective for dates of injury on or after October 1, 2026,' so the controlling fact is the date of injury, not the date you filed, were rated, or were paid.

How much did Minnesota's permanent partial disability amounts go up?

Every one of the 20 rows in Minn. Stat. 176.101, subd. 2a rose by the same ratio, approximately 20.1 percent, as computed from the old and new figures in Chapter 103, sec. 10. The lowest row went from $114,260 to $137,240 and the highest from $567,840 to $682,045. The act itself states no percentage.

How is a Minnesota permanent partial disability payment calculated?

Minn. Stat. 176.101, subd. 2a, para. (b) multiplies the impairment rating, expressed as a percentage of the whole body under the rules adopted pursuant to section 176.105, by the single dollar amount the schedule assigns to the band that rating falls in. Subdivision 2a also caps recovery at 100 percent of the whole body.

Did Chapter 103 change how Minnesota rates an impairment?

No. Chapter 103, sec. 10 changed only the dollar multipliers. The rating rules the Department of Labor and Industry identifies for injuries on or after July 1, 1993, Minnesota Rules 5223.0300 through 5223.0650 as amended effective August 9, 2010, were not amended by the act.

Can a nurse practitioner now diagnose PTSD for a Minnesota workers' compensation claim?

Chapter 103, sec. 8 adds 'psychiatric mental health nurse practitioner' to the professionals named in Minn. Stat. 176.011, subd. 15, para. (d), alongside a licensed psychiatrist and psychologist. The session law makes that section effective for dates of injury on or after October 1, 2026.

Did Chapter 103 raise the attorney fee cap in Minnesota workers' compensation cases?

No. Laws 2024, ch. 97, sec. 4 raised the cap to 20 percent of the first $275,000 with a $55,000 cumulative maximum for dates of injury on or after October 1, 2024. Chapter 103, sec. 9 updated the retainer-agreement notice in Minn. Stat. 176.081, subd. 9, which had still recited the older $130,000 and $26,000 figures.

Why does the fee provision reach back to October 1, 2024?

Section 9 of Chapter 103 states that it 'is effective the day following final enactment and applies to dates of injury on or after October 1, 2024,' which matches the reach of the 2024 fee increase the notice was out of step with. It backdates a required disclosure, not a change in the fee itself.

How long does a Minnesota insurer now have to reverse an accepted claim?

Chapter 103, sec. 12 extends the period in Minn. Stat. 176.221, subd. 1 from 60 to 90 days from notice to or knowledge of the injury, for dates of injury on or after October 1, 2026. After that period, payment may be terminated only by filing a notice under section 176.239.

When was Chapter 103 signed, and who voted for it?

Per the Office of the Revisor of Statutes, S.F. 3720 passed the Senate 65 to 0 on May 11, 2026 and the House 132 to 1 on May 14, 2026, was presented to the Governor on May 15, 2026, and was signed on May 18, 2026 at 4:17 p.m.