See All<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\nNo one\u2019s immune to professional anxiety, though. \u201cAm I going to be a 40-year-old influencer posting my outfits?\u201d one TikToker wondered. Finance used to be the stock answer for those musing a career pivot. Now we\u2019re all thinking, Should we just go into AI? The only worry on one engineer\u2019s mind seemed to be his equity stake shrinking as recruitment ramps up. Of course, there are plenty of people, especially at the very top, doing all right on their salary plus bonus and stock options as well as exterminators and dentists and dog walkers making a decent living who won\u2019t be replaced by a chatbot anytime soon. Claude can\u2019t rid your household of a lice infestation! New Yorkers have always fretted about how much (or how little) they make and have been since long before this magazine started keeping track in 1972. The aim of our latest investigation wasn\u2019t simply an excuse to be nosy. The hope was to capture this moment and provide some sideways service to those wondering what else there might be to do. It\u2019s not too late to try to become a tugboat engineer, is it?<\/p>\n
90 percent from walking<\/strong>
10 percent from dog-sitting<\/strong><\/p>\nI charge at least $40 an hour. I have a steady base of around 30 dogs, but the unpredictability is hard. Sometimes you start off the day thinking you\u2019re going to make $500, then clients cancel. I\u2019ll have a slow day around once a week and make only about $250. One client whose dog got walked twice a day, five days a week, moved away, which meant I lost $15,000 in annual income. And then, you know, the dogs die. It\u2019s a real one-two punch. Your friend you see every day dies, and you also take a massive pay cut. Suddenly, you need to put feelers out to find new clients. I know I have to stop dog-walking the way I am. It\u2019s too physically exhausting. I want to switch to training dogs, but it\u2019s hard to get going on its own and I don\u2019t have enough of a safety net.<\/p>\n
I own my practice, and I use a kind of sliding scale. People pay anywhere from $35 to $450 a session. There are some patients I have an agreement with that as they make more money, I increase my fee. The ethos is very much that therapy should be accessible, but I should also have a comfortable lifestyle. There was definitely a point where I realized people who had means were underpaying. And I learned to charge those people more because there\u2019s also a therapeutic element in that \u2014 if it\u2019s meaningless to you to throw away $65, for example, you\u2019re going to cancel at the last minute and you\u2019re not going to have a lot of respect for the process. What I\u2019ve observed is that people\u2019s relationship to money has actually very little to do with how much they make. I have a billionaire who feels poor every day, and the high cost of the treatment is very much a part of their treatment.<\/p>\n
$450,000 base salary and from dividends<\/strong>
$2 million in equity\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\nAI companies are offering these eye-catching amounts on paper, but the only way to support compensation at that level is by diluting employees\u2019 equity. I suspect many newer hires will be surprised by how slowly their shares grow relative to the headline valuation. I do think the job will look very different in thenext few years, but the most in-demand engineers are more in demand than ever right now. Technical people actually have a leg up because you can become a 100x engineer if you know how to optimize the environment for your coding agents. Learn to recognize when something is taking too long because the approach or architecture is set up incorrectly. Learn what to delegate and when. These are skill sets that non\u2013software engineers won\u2019t have.<\/p>\n
$104,000 from taxable income (escorting, porn, cam modeling)<\/strong>
$160,000 from nontaxable income (cash gifts from partner for living expenses)<\/strong>
$20,000 from investment income<\/strong><\/p>\nIn 2024, I made $800,000, and the year before that, I made $1.2 million. But last year, I took a kind of maternity leave to get to know my primary partner\u2019s children. I also started a business helping adult-industry professionals with their finances. The industry has the NFL problem where people get a great deal of money in a short period of time and then they retire with very little because they don\u2019t know how to handle their money. Escorting comes and goes in waves. A lot of girls say they\u2019re making less money these days camming \u2014 for many reasons, including age-verification laws and foreign competition. Clients can pay a Ukrainian something like 50 cents a minute instead of paying you $6 a minute.<\/p>\n
![\"Restaurant](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/56578d5b7b9c33ac0b89836648f6613ece-comp-1.rvertical.w570.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
Photo: Frankie Alduino\n <\/p>\n
I\u2019ve been an interior designer for 30 years and running my own firm for more than 20. My clients are mostly in finance and entertainment. I have anywhere from 12 to 18 projects in various stages and sizes going at all times. If I\u2019m doing a three-bedroom in the city, that could cost at least $1.5 million to $2 million to complete. I\u2019m charging 35 percent on top of that as my markup. At the beginning of a project, I charge a design fee, which starts around $75,000, and it goes up from there. It\u2019s amazing to me how expensive design has become. I used to be able to get a custom sofa made from a great fancy upholstery shop for maybe ten grand. Now it\u2019s, like, $25,000. But it\u2019s quite hard to achieve the look that I want without spending a decent amount of money.<\/p>\n
In addition to the vows that priests make to remain unmarried or be obedient to the bishop, we also vow to live a life of poverty. I receive a salary from my parish, and that is redonated to the motherhouse, which provides the necessities: room, board, insurance, use of a car as necessary \u2014 all those sorts of things. I live near Columbus Circle, where the church is, with 20 other priests; all of our salaries or pensions go into the house, so it\u2019s kind of a socialist setup. Then we\u2019ll get an allowance. We do have some limits, like on how much clothing we can buy in a year, but it usually covers the incidentals like going to CVS or getting a haircut. I think we have around the same salary as the priests of the Archdiocese of New York, and I do know that they\u2019re always complaining it\u2019s not enough.<\/p>\n
$107,768 from Substack, book proposals, and other projects<\/strong>
$55,000 from ghostwriting books<\/strong>
$2,000 from personal writing<\/strong><\/p>\nBecause I had a slow year, I did a lot of moonlighting on smaller projects: Substacks for famous people, book proposals. I had 11 different clients, wrote five proposals, finished two books, and started another book at the end of the year. I get paid a flat fee per book; there\u2019s a wide range and a lot of factors in a deal. Some people like to have their name on the cover, but sometimes you get paid less that way. I started ghosting five years ago. I called my agent and said, \u201cI want to be a writer full time. What does that mean?\u201d My agent said, \u201cCan you write a book in three months?\u201d<\/p>\n
$30,000 from book advance<\/strong>
$14,000 from teaching two retreats<\/strong>
$5,000 from narrating own audiobook<\/strong><\/p>\nI\u2019m trying to manifest more abundance, but I\u2019m really feeling the income streams have dwindled. I have over 800,000 Instagram followers. Before, if I wanted to do a brand partnership on social media, $10,000 was an easy get. Now it\u2019s, like, $500. I pretty much live from a bucket of savings.<\/p>\n
$45,000 from working at the cart<\/strong>
$2,000 from Grubhub deliveries<\/strong><\/p>\nOn a daily basis, the cart will sell between $500 and $700, and that will net a profit for me anywhere between $150 and $200. The expenses include all the supplies, like water, coffee, and pastries, but also another worker who gets paid a salary every week and the driver who tows the car back and forth from the garage to the spot in midtown. The cart is open Monday to Friday between four in the morning and 1 p.m. Then I go to the garage, clean the cart, and prep it for the next day. In the first three months of the year, when it\u2019s so cold out, things are very slow. For the most part, it\u2019s workers and staff in storefronts and construction workers, not suits and finance people. Also a bunchof tourists. Compared to other years, 2025 was kind of slower. There is this regular customer who would always get a coffee, a bacon-egg-and-cheese, and a Danish. Now, he skips the Danish.<\/p>\n
$250,000 from social content and brand partnerships<\/strong>
$60,000 from consulting<\/strong>
$10,000 from selling clothes<\/strong><\/p>\nI have more than 300,000 followers across Instagram and TikTok, but Instagram is where I make 70 percent of my money. For brand partnerships, the pay really ranges. If I like a brand, I\u2019ll charge under my rate, which is usually between $5,000 and $8,000. But I did a holiday campaign that was $25,000 for three videos. The market has changed a lot. In 2018, 2019, I really hit my peak \u2014 over $400,000. That was before TikTok was really popular, which meant new competition. I think about what\u2019s next a lot: Am I going to be a 40-year-old influencer posting my outfits? When I do consulting or influencer marketing, I\u2019ll charge about 20 percent of what the spend is, so $20,000 if they\u2019re spending $100,000. My biggest personal expense is rent, $5,500 a month for a one-bedroom in Manhattan, and I also spend about $1,000 a month on a personal trainer. I feel like I need to look good, travel, show people my life is interesting \u2014 you know, fly to Europe three times a year \u2014 to stay relevant.<\/p>\n
$120,000 base salary<\/strong>
$50,000 commission, representing 10 percent of the gallery\u2019s profit on dealers\u2019 sales<\/strong><\/p>\nThe art world has gone through a shock. From 2020 to 2025, all these speculators entered the market. There were some pieces that sold for tens of thousands of dollars in 2020 and then for 100 times that from 2021 onward. Then the industry crashed. We lost about a third of our revenue stream from speculators who got involved during the pandemic. It was a rough year for the art market and for artists. Galleries had to say, \u201cWho do we really want to grow with?\u201d<\/p>\n
$30,000 from barista work<\/strong>
$18,000 from part-time personal-assistant work<\/strong>
$12,000 from babysitting<\/strong>
$3,000 from acting, writing, and producing<\/strong><\/p>\nI\u2019ve been living a gig lifestyle ever since I graduated from college about seven years ago. I definitely don\u2019t want to be doing this forever. I\u2019d rather just act and write and produce; it\u2019s the other jobs that allow me to do those things. But it can be really rough. I never clock out. I\u2019ll work one job in the morning and then I\u2019ll go to another job afterward, or I will be sending emails while the kids I\u2019m babysitting are at soccer. Technically, I\u2019m working seven days a week. It is what it is. Today I spent an hour on the phone tracking a health-care claim for one of the people I\u2019m an assistant to, but I also worked on stuff for a show that I\u2019m producing and then I picked up a babysitting job for tonight. I\u2019m always just trying to fill a pocket of time if I have it, to find something else to do.<\/p>\n
$62,000 from hourly wages<\/strong>
$13,000 from tips<\/strong><\/p>\nI like smiling, and I like talking. So the job is easy in that regard. But I work in a luxury building, and the wealth disparity is extremely apparent. People have their dog walked three times a day, and I know that could be up to $50 each walk; they get food delivered constantly. I think 99 percent of tenants are extremely nice. They tip us well. I have no complaints there. It\u2019s just knowing there\u2019s a big difference in how we live. Plus I was a volunteer for Zohran. We\u2019re not supposed to talk about politics, but sometimes they bring it up, and you kind of have to just be like, \u201cOh, yeah, crazy.\u201d My whole job is code-switching. I put on the act, I put on the uniform, and that is my job for the day. In the past, my wife has even had to say, \u201cYo, turn off the voice. You\u2019re home.\u201d<\/p>\n
$55,000 from surrogacy<\/strong>
$54,000 from substitute teaching<\/strong><\/p>\nI got interested in surrogacy because my sister can\u2019t carry a baby. So I decided that after I was done with my kids, I wanted to help another family find that joy. Even if it weren\u2019t compensated, I would still do it, but it is an added reward. I got a $4,000 sign-on bonus and then $750 when we started the IVF medication. When we did the embryo transfer, I got around $1,500 and then another $1,000 when the pregnancy was confirmed. After we heard the heartbeat, I started getting my $6,000 monthly payments. I also get an extra $300 a month for transport, gas, tolls, and child care when I have appointments. I\u2019m currently at 34 weeks. I call the baby my \u201cfriend.\u201d When we go into a sonogram, I\u2019m like, \u201cHey, friend, I need you to show up for your parents.\u201d The compensation is going straight into my own kids\u2019 college funds.<\/p>\n
$9.5 million from consulting fees<\/strong>
$7.5 million in stock in companies that went public<\/strong><\/p>\nThe big-picture way that I make my money is consulting; that work covers my day-to-day. Separate from that, I had stock in a couple of companies that went public. Because I made money later in life, my tastes and needs are a lot simpler. I don\u2019t spend money on things like having multiple homes, or flying private, or watches, or boats. I make enough money that I do what I want and I don\u2019t think about it. I also don\u2019t believe in leaving my kids a crazy amount of money because everyone I know who has that is fucked up, so why would I do that to them?<\/p>\n
I worked around 40 hours a week with Uber Eats last year and then 20 hours a week with Grubhub and DoorDash. I work ten-to-12 hours a day. Ever since the minimum-wage bill passed in New York, Uber only lets you work a set amount of hours, based on your track record, but anyone can work during \u201cbusy time\u201d \u2014 around lunch and dinnertime. Also, any time it\u2019s raining, any time it\u2019s snowing, anyone can work. With DoorDash, you often cannot work if you don\u2019t schedule your shifts. I like Grubhub the most \u2014 they ask the customer to tip at the beginning. Up until recently, Uber and DoorDash asked them to tip at the end, which means sometimes people forget and you don\u2019t get a tip at all. But the city just passed a law forcing food-delivery apps to make tipping easier. So many customers have told me, \u201cI tried to tip you, but I didn\u2019t see the tipping option.\u201d<\/p>\n
$150,000 from art sales<\/strong>
$100,000 from investment income<\/strong><\/p>\nI\u2019ve been a working artist for 20 years. Some years I can sell a few six-figure paintings to museums or through galleries. Some years, it\u2019s just one six-figure painting. I sold work to six museums last year, including one big six-figure sale, and I can barely afford to pay for my studio, mortgage, and maintenance, plus basic living expenses and probably going out once a week for dinner. That\u2019s the scary part of where we are in New York right now. A lot of the middle- and lower-tier galleries are gone. And sales figures are down; auction and secondary-market sales are down. If you leave the city, you trade visibility and access for a better quality of life. But you have to come to terms with the fact that a quality-of-life change comes without recognition and without your work being seen. I don\u2019t think that would make me happy.<\/p>\n
$127,000 from Substack subscriptions<\/strong>
$148,300 from brand partnerships<\/strong><\/p>\nI launched my Substack a few years ago. I was freelancing and trying a bunch of stuff out. My subscribers have gone up around 50 percent year over year; 2025 was my best year yet. I post about twice a week. Every few days, I get an email from Stripe that says, \u201cHey, we\u2019re depositing X amount of money into your bank account.\u201d Sometimes it\u2019s $150, sometimes $1,200. Still, the newsletter as a steady income stream has been a major stress relief. And not being tethered to any sort of editorial calendar or mandate is so freeing. I am the writer and the editor and the editor-in-chief and the publisher. And I am making more than I ever could as a journalist.<\/p>\n
![\"Influencer:](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/1d531e47dfecd66d378b40992b0423e346-comp-2.rvertical.w570.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
Photo: Frankie Alduino\n <\/p>\n
$36,000 from freelance event photography<\/strong>
$20,000 from rental income<\/strong>
$17,300 from licensing and royalty income<\/strong><\/p>\nI\u2019m 60, and I\u2019ve been photographing events for 40 years. I make about $300 to shoot a red carpet, which doesn\u2019t include any of my expenses. Corporate clients and brand events tend to be more, between $750 and $1,500. Sometimes a great gig comes around and you\u2019ll get $3,000. Last year, I made $14,000 from stock-photography sales, which have really been a race to the bottom. When I first started, a photo in a magazine could get $5,000. Now, my cut is 80 cents or $4 for a photograph, maybe $18 if a national paper runs it. In the early \u201990s, I was making over $100,000 a year freelancing. In those days, going viral was Madonna dancing at a nightclub. I would go there, get a photo, develop the film overnight, and, in the morning, shop the photos around. Making what I made then today is impossible. The industry really peaked in the Paris Hilton era.<\/p>\n
After my expenses and my agents\u2019 20 percent, I took home $285,000 last year. That\u2019s mostly from eight active clients on my roster of around 20. You\u2019re working basically as much as your clients are working. During a press tour, you\u2019re doing maybe 20 looks, so that could be $30,000. And there are ways to supplement your income, like a brand paying you a few thousand to dress your client in its clothes. The studios are really screwing us all and are tightening their grip on glam costs for talent. Netflix can say, \u201cWe have only $500 for a look for a press event,\u201d and those of us who have worked for a while won\u2019t take it. But they just give it to a younger stylist who will be like, Hell yeah. It\u2019s why a lot of us stylists are looking at other ways to make money and trying to become tastemakers. I did one influencer-adjacent thing with a brand and got $15,000.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve been here for a little over ten years and make the average amount for entry-level workers at the company. After three years, you basically max out. You don\u2019t make much more. Most of the raises that Amazon will give you, regardless of your tenure with the company, are inflation raises. I have to work mandatory overtime from the end of November until the New Year. And then you have Amazon Prime. In July, there\u2019s one week of mandatory overtime for Prime Day, then there\u2019s Prime Big Deal Days in October. So all those mandatory-overtime hours, 55 hours a week for three months, are included in my salary.<\/p>\n
$65,000 from freelance writing and teaching<\/strong>
$40,000 from social-media posts<\/strong>
$30,000 from social-media consulting<\/strong>
$5,000 from investments<\/strong>
$2,000 from stand-up<\/strong><\/p>\nDuring the pandemic and the writers\u2019 strike, I stopped thinking about how to make a TV show \u2014 which is the dream for most comedy writers \u2014 and started thinking about how to make money. That\u2019s when I turned to social media. The people who are making a lot of money in comedy are not who you\u2019d expect. I imagine that there are famous people making $40,000 a year, but others with 100,000 followers are making $200,000. I sold my stand-up special for $20,000. Other than that, I\u2019ve lost money doing stand-up, if you count the Ubers. You usually get paid nothing.<\/p>\n
I mostly work in Manhattan and Brooklyn, around the Park Slope area, where there are lots of kids. We go house to house, and we also do school checks and camp checks. We get paid by appointment. If a family is fully infested, it takes two or three hours \u2014 it\u2019s around $150 to $225 per head, depending on hair length and severity of infestation. Tips are very individual. You might get $100 or maybe $20. Or maybe $10. You never know. I made around $2,000 to $3,000 in tips last year. But I\u2019m so grateful for everything. I have a daughter; she\u2019s 8 years old. She\u2019s living in Georgia, my home country. This is such a hard time for me, but I\u2019m so happy that I get to have contact with kids all day. It\u2019s a lot of fun.<\/p>\n
A paper was six cents when I started in this business in 1967. But I haven\u2019t had a newspaper on my stand for seven years. You don\u2019t make money like you used to. I sell a lot of water in the summer. Gum sells for $2.50. Some days, I don\u2019t even make $10 and I still sit here. You get used to it because you\u2019re always gonna have somebody come by and start a conversation. I pay $1,076 for my license, and I\u2019m lucky if I make $4,000 a year. Friends help me pay my electric bill, my insurance; my Social Security check goes to rent. See, my rent is very, very cheap: $280-something a month for a Hell\u2019s Kitchen townhouse. I do this because I love what I do, not because of the money.<\/p>\n
My practice brought in about $6 million last year, which is on trend with past years. I wanted to have my own practice so I could have control and make more money. I had no idea what to expect. I had a decade of surgical training, but none of it was oriented toward running a business. It\u2019s really shooting in the dark because nobody in school talks about this stuff. Fees in plastic surgery are very opaque. You kind of get a sense of what to charge over time by talking to colleagues and patients who fit the standard socioeconomic profile. At my practice, a mommy makeover is between $50,000 and $80,000. A breast augmentation is between $20,000 and $30,000. So many more people have been coming in for loose-skin operations since the rise of GLP-1\u2019s, but lipo is still a third of my practice, and it can range anywhere from $6,000 to $10,000.<\/p>\n
$113,115 from the SHSAT<\/strong>
$31,940 from the SAT<\/strong>
$13,080 from the SSAT<\/strong>
$11,160 from the ACT<\/strong>
$5,767 from academics<\/strong>
$4,200 from ISEE<\/strong>
$1,440 from Regents<\/strong>
$240 from TACHS<\/strong>
$300 from tips and miscellaneous<\/strong><\/p>\nI started working in high school for a woman who owned a small tutoring business. When she died in 2020, I effectively inherited it. I charge $240 an hour and mostly do hour sessions \u2014 some group, some individual. I mainly tutor middle-schoolers for the SHSAT (Specialized High Schools Admissions Test), and I also do private-school exams and the ACT and SAT, which are making a big comeback. In 2020, when schools went standardized-testing optional, I made $1,950 on SAT and ACT tutoring. In 2022, I made $16,700 from them. And last year, I made $43,100 from the two tests. In the fall, before the SHSAT, it\u2019s two months of nonstop work, seven days a week. That\u2019s when I make about 40 percent of my annual income. Then it gets quiet in December, January, and February, when I might make $700 in a week.<\/p>\n
$19,137 from Off Broadway<\/strong>
$12,322 from unemployment insurance<\/strong>
$4,580 from Broadway<\/strong>
$3,450 from social-media brand collaborations<\/strong>
$1,801 from freelance performances<\/strong>
$822 from workshops<\/strong><\/p>\nIn December, I debuted on Broadway as an ensemble member for the first time, after a decade working in the business. I get paid $3,395 a week before my agent takes 10 percent, 2.5 percent union dues, and taxes. If I\u2019m performing a bigger role, I get a bump: $475 a show. I\u2019m on a contract until May, so I\u2019ll make about $50,000 from the role. It\u2019s a feast now, but it will be famine. Before this show, I was sending out auditions for smaller things, like regional theater, where I\u2019d make closer to $1,000 a week. A lot of actors do workshops, when they\u2019re not on contract, where they work on developing someone\u2019s musical, which pays about $600 a week for more nine-to-five days. I also do brand collaborations on social, and I get about $900 for a video, but that\u2019s not reliable.<\/p>\n
$250,000 base salary<\/strong>
$40,000 from bonuses<\/strong><\/p>\nPediatricians in New York get paid less than in other cities since the market is saturated. I get emails from recruiters multiple times a day offering me twice my salary to work upstate or in Tennessee \u2014 or $500,000 a year to work abroad. If you finish your notes within 24-to-72 hours, or if you do a really good job following the guidelines, like testing all females over 15 for chlamydia, you get a bonus. You can take shifts in the ER and get an extra $1,000 to $2,000. When I was younger, I did that, but now I have kids.<\/p>\n
My salary in 2011 was $45,000. Teachers\u2019 salaries go up significantly after you\u2019ve been working for ten years because you get a longevity boost. I can\u2019t remember when I started making six figures, but I remember being like, Oh my God, I\u2019m making six figures now. I have enough money every month to pay rent and eat and travel. I put away about 10 percent of my salary for retirement, and that\u2019s on top of my pension. I have a railroad rent-stabilized apartment I\u2019ve been in for 15 years. I pay $1,400, so I know I\u2019m luckier than most, but it\u2019s absolutely falling to bits. If I didn\u2019t have that, or if I had to support someone else, it would be much, much harder to get by. I\u2019ll probably end up moving so I can have a chance of owning a home, but the problem with leaving New York before retirement is you don\u2019t get the full benefits.<\/p>\n
$85,000 base salary<\/strong>
$26,000 doctoral stipend<\/strong>
$150 from monthly tutoring<\/strong><\/p>\nThere are definitely moments when it feels difficult to know that many families at my school pay full tuition, which is more than $65,000 a year, which is almost all of my salary. I\u2019m still in a doctoral program because the stipend makes it significantly more possible for me to live in New York. It\u2019s too much money to give up. Right now, when I get that stipend check, I put it into savings and it becomes an emergency fund. I\u2019ll almost certainly have to pick up another job once my program is over, especially when I think about having a kid in a couple years. There\u2019s been real panic where I\u2019ve been like, Should I enter another program so that I can continue getting a stipend and put off having to pay my student loans again?<\/p>\n
$1 million base salary<\/strong>
$2.5 million in carried interest<\/strong><\/p>\nVenture is actually a really terrible finance career path from a near-term cash perspective. Because if you are working at a venture fund, you are compensated with a base salary and then a carry, which is effectively an ownership interest in the funds that you\u2019re helping to invest. But that carry pays you only when a company exits \u2014 an IPO or gets bought. For a partner like me, the carry is typically high. I probably vest into $2.5 million to $3 million a year; last year was pretty standard. It could be ten years until I see a dollar of it, or I could get nothing. From a financial-planning perspective, I can\u2019t count on it. And so venture is very much a business for people who are comfortable living off their base salary for a very long time. And then in theory, in the long run, it\u2019s very good. There\u2019s a lot of money to be made.<\/p>\n
$250,000 from journalism<\/strong>
$250,000 from investments<\/strong><\/p>\nI\u2019ve always been a 1099 guy. My journalism income comes from a lot of different places, including my regular column, but everything is funneled through my literary agent, who takes 15 percent. When you write an op-ed for the Times, you suck it up and just take what they give you. When I was writing for magazines in the late 2000s, I was making around $5 per word; the price now is a lot less. I write books, too. I\u2019m always kind of surprised when I get to April 15 and my accountant presents me with what I owe. I don\u2019t know how I\u2019ve been able to \u2014 year after year \u2014 keep this going. I\u2019m not personally worried about AI, but, you know, I\u2019m at the end of my career.<\/p>\n
I started in 2021, and it\u2019s definitely gotten harder to make money. I work at least 12 hours a day, usually seven days a week. I start at 5 a.m. I have to rent a car to drive for Uber because the city is giving out very few TLC vehicle licenses. I spend $850 a week on the car, $300 on gas, and $200 on my E-ZPass, which leaves me with $700 a week \u2014 so $36,400 a year. I struggle a lot. I am paid by the trip. It depends on the amount of time a trip takes and how many miles away it is, but I don\u2019t know how it works. Tips are random. Sometimes you get a tip right away; sometimes you get it months later. Sometimes you\u2019ll talk with a customer and he\u2019ll say he\u2019s going to tip you $50 and then tips you only $5. You just never know.<\/p>\n
![\"Public](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/43f1d9d5d5b122e6dd372afeecf9d0013d-comp-3.rvertical.w570.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
Photo: Frankie Alduino\n <\/p>\n
$78,000 base salary<\/strong>
$3,400 from cycling lessons at $55 a class<\/strong>
$2,500 from running a church choir<\/strong><\/p>\nWe were facing a funding gap of $55,000 because of DOGE cuts to federal agencies. In response, our neighborhood really stepped up and donated. Some are big gifts, but mostly it was smaller contributions. Soliciting donations can be really awkward. There are a lot of soft asks. I\u2019m at the top of the food chain here at this particular organization. It\u2019s a fine salary, and I can make it all work, but if something happens, it throws us for a loop. Of course, there are times when I see people my age at director levels making a lot more money. I wish I had that sometimes, but the work I do is for the greater good.<\/p>\n
My practice brought in $5 million. I\u2019ve had better years, but I\u2019m taking more time off as I get older. I work four days a week and take ten days off every month. I\u2019m the only dentist here, but the overhead is high. I would say our income is 25 percent preventative care, 25 percent fillings, and 50 percent veneers, crowns, and Invisalign. The price of Invisalign depends on the length of the treatment, but since we prescribe it fairly often, I\u2019m able to keep it between $6,000 to $7,000. We take insurance, but we\u2019re not in-network. And since COVID, patients have been asking more questions about their out-of-pocket costs. Still, sometimes I\u2019m like, How do people just say \u201cyes\u201d? I\u2019m always amazed by what people can afford and are willing to spend.<\/p>\n
$750 a day on the boat<\/strong>
$5,000 from 15 days of working as an electrician with his cousin<\/strong><\/p>\nI work for a company that transports petroleum, so I make more than someone who pushes less-expensive products like gravel and salt. New York is one of the higher-paid ports. The people in the New York Harbor make a lot more than, say, the people down in the Mississippi River doing the same job. What we do here is 14 days on and then we have off for 14 days. If you do want to work extra, you can definitely do that. I know some people who pay off their houses in two years by just staying on the boat for two years straight. You can make extra money or just go on vacation every time you get home. Sometimes during my weeks off, I go and do electrical work with my cousin. But when I\u2019m off watch, I value sleep more than anything.<\/p>\n
$292,000 from commissions<\/strong>
$8,000 from teaching barre<\/strong><\/p>\nEven though I\u2019m teaching barre in Cobble Hill only two-to-four times a week and it\u2019s just a small percentage of my income, half of my real-estate business is generated from teaching. My clients are people I meet in the studio or connections I make through them. My sales volume has been steadily increasing, and last year I did slightly better than in 2024; it\u2019s a wide range. Here in Cobble Hill and Boerum Hill, I represented clients who bought a $2.3 million duplex, a $3.5 million luxury condo, and a $2.5 million condo in a converted church. I also helped clients buy a $385,000 studio in Gramercy and a $450,000 one-bedroom on the Upper West Side.<\/p>\n
I work for a nonprofit. There\u2019s city funding, there\u2019s a ton of private donors, so it\u2019s a mix of private and public funding. My impression is that immigration attorneys who work at public-defense organizations like Legal Aid or Bronx Defenders generally make more toward $80,000, which is really the max you can make as a first-year in my field. With everything going on right now, the pressure and the workload have increased. Pretty much every aspect of the immigration process has gotten riskier and more dangerous for clients; the law changes literally every week. People are working a lot, and the burnout is really high. It feels underpaid for sure. My family paid for law school, so I don\u2019t have debt, but that\u2019s a huge burden on other lawyers. And then there\u2019s the emotional toll of the work.<\/p>\n
My business brought in $924,000 in 2025. It was a good year. Around $350,000 went to staff. I do have quite a bit of overhead, about 50 percent. The other $100,000 is literally entertainment. I\u2019m out every night. I\u2019m going to every hot restaurant; we\u2019re getting caviar and all that hocus-pocus. I rent a house in the Hamptons in the summer, and we\u2019re getting tables and bottles. A lot of living the life goes into this. It\u2019s a seven-days-a-week hustle. I have eight clients currently on retainer, ranging from $5,000 to $25,000 a month. The $5,000 clients I keep for portfolio diversity. I could bill another account for five times that, but I\u2019m looking for the right fit. I\u2019m happy living in a one-bedroom apartment. I\u2019m not looking for the next best thing, and there\u2019s really nothing I seek. How many Cartier Love bracelets does one really need?<\/p>\n
We opened in 2023. We fundraised $600,000 for the restaurant, so I didn\u2019t put any money into it. A lot of our investors are people in the neighborhood. Paying them back is a slow process. Labor is always the thing that we spend the most money on, but it\u2019s really important to us to pay our teams well. And shit always goes wrong. We spend so much money on, like, the HVAC or fridge breaking. We\u2019ve increased prices subtly over the last year. The big area is cocktail prices, which across New York have bumped up. I think we\u2019re finally in a position where it doesn\u2019t feel as daunting to owe so much money, but it\u2019s definitely a responsibility. People really believed in us, and it\u2019s our job to make sure that we are distributing dividends, so that\u2019s always stressful. It makes every mistake count a little bit more.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve been a home health aide for ten years. My main patient last year was in Brooklyn. I spent most of my time taking care of her. I worked two days a week, and I was being paid for 13 hours of work each day \u2014 my agency, Loyal Home Care, budgets eight hours of sleep and three hours for mealtimes into our wages. But I was basically working 24 hours a day. She was active, and I was worried she would fall, so I would watch her all day and night. This is a pretty common experience for health aides. The agency can deny our overtime, but you can\u2019t deny a patient. When they say, \u201cOh, I need a drink of water; I need to use the bathroom,\u201d how could you possibly say \u201cno\u201d to them?<\/p>\n
60 percent from Pilates lessons<\/strong>
40 percent from freelance professional dancing<\/strong><\/p>\nLincoln Center pays us dancers about $233 per performance and about $65 an hour per rehearsal. I get to dance on one of the largest stages in the world, but Pilates is the paycheck. I do a lot of private lessons since they\u2019re easier to reschedule. But because it\u2019s one-to-one, I\u2019m expected to be their therapist. We talk about their divorces, their affairs, what their kids are doing. I have to take notes on my clients\u2019 lives and review them before I see them. All three studios pay me differently. One studio is a flat rate. Another I start at a base rate and get a bonus if more people come. My Google calendar looks insane; I ride the subway six-to-eight times a day. When I say my income out loud, a lot of people in the arts say, \u201cThat\u2019s good,\u201d but it\u2019s pennies. I make enough to survive in my tiny Brooklyn apartment, but I work seven days a week, sunup to sundown.<\/p>\n
$25,000 from budtending<\/strong>
$5,000 from background-acting work<\/strong><\/p>\nMarijuana has been legal for five years, but last year the market really ramped up. Everyone is trying to do the newest and best thing, trying to push New York weed forward. But there\u2019s a lot of false advertising: Some products claim they\u2019re quad-infused when they\u2019re only infused twice. There are a lot of opportunities, but there are also so many more people joining this industry. It\u2019s really competitive. Finding a job is first come, first served and mostly luck. Our store\u2019s advantage is that we offer delivery and we include the taxes in the price. Also you can smell our product; in a lot of places, it\u2019s behind a screen. I get paid $19 an hour, but I also get extra money from background work \u2014 I was in Stranger Things.<\/p>\n
My clients are getting to a point in their lives where they\u2019re looking to settle down. I am the founder of my own company. I do everything from admin to sourcing the singles. There are referrals. I sometimes just sit in a restaurant or a bar and engage people in conversation. Matchmaking clients tend to be more high net worth. It is obviously a very valuable service; people will pay anywhere from $30,000 to $60,000 for a six-month contract. I haven\u2019t implemented success fees yet, but as far as I know, I\u2019ve never had an unhappy client.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve been a professional for more than a decade. But since my paycheck for last season as a series regular, I\u2019ve made zero dollars. That\u2019s how big the swings are in my industry. Network television is definitely not what it once was. They are now quoting experienced actors lower rates than what they offered people with no credits a decade ago. The contract I got paid handsomely for was negotiated several years ago. And it felt like I was being gorgeously paid. More money than I would\u2019ve made on almost any other job, which is why I took it. I\u2019m saving that money. I don\u2019t consider myself at all immune to what is coming for everyone\u2019s industry \u2014 meaning AI.<\/p>\n
$90,000 from pickleball<\/strong>
$30,000 from various entertainment jobs<\/strong><\/p>\nI got really into pickleball around COVID. This 75-year-old guy was teaching me, and it got to a point where I could beat him, so I asked him if he wanted to hire me as a coach. I got a coaching certification the next weekend. I charge $150 for an hourlong private session. The club I work for gives me 40 percent of that. It also pays me for admin work \u2014 $25 anhour \u2014 and then I\u2019ll get double my hourly rate if we\u2019re running a corporate event or tournament. I came to New York to model 21 years ago. I don\u2019t do auditions anymore, but I have a few clients who still book me directly. And I also work as an emcee and an auctioneer at charity galas. I usually get anywhere from $2,000 to $5,000 for those. My life in New York has always been a lot of 1099s, but less these days. My wife\u2019s a doctor, and that helps a lot in terms of financial stability.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve been with the same clients for a long time. I cook for them Monday through Friday and then will do events on the weekends. I charge a day rate plus the cost of groceries and any other travel expenses. The rate is based on how labor intensive I think a job will be, but this city is make-believe land. You can kind of throw a number out there and someone is willing to pay it. My weekday clients are incredibly wealthy. Their day-to-day doesn\u2019t really compare to mine, but I am so enmeshed in their life. I travel with them. I sleep in their home. I have access to every staff member. They\u2019ll have meetings in front of me but not in front of other people. I\u2019m there when they want to bitch. I do occasionally get tipped, and there are definitely perks to being around people with money when they don\u2019t want something. I mean, the main perk is flying private. Once you fly private, you\u2019re like, Damn. This coach seat blows.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve been working in New York restaurants for over 20 years. I\u2019ve always been able to make decent money doing it. Aside from the general manager, odds are when you enter a high-end restaurant, the top-tier front-of-house staff \u2014 head bartenders, sommeliers, and captains \u2014 are all making more than most of the management because of tips. I would say about 90 percent of what I make each night comes from tips. In the last few years, prices have definitely gone up. But that\u2019s not unique to our restaurant. I\u2019m consistently blown away by the prices at restaurants I know for a fact are not at the same quality level as my own. Also, compared to pre-COVID, the ability to move certain luxury items has gone up. The amount of caviar that the restaurant goes through is so much more than it ever was.<\/p>\n
$16,600 from day-care profits<\/strong>
$14,400 from trainings and consulting<\/strong><\/p>\nLast year, I lost a lot of kids. I live in the Bronx, and a bunch of families in my neighborhood lost their child-care vouchers. We\u2019re talking about people who make as much as I do; most of the moms I work with are home health aides. They can\u2019t afford full-time child care. If I have 16 kids, I can pay myself for 40 hours of work. But last year, I didn\u2019t, and obviously I\u2019m still doing the same amount of work. I\u2019ve been running the day care out of my home for more than seven years. It\u2019s a profession I entered out of necessity and have stayed in out of passion. I pay for everything \u2014 food, cleaning supplies, toys \u2014 and we have to meet the same requirements as a large company in terms of paying for liability insurance, which can feel pointless in this industry. I mean, if something happens to one of my children, I lose my license. End of story.<\/p>\n
$650,000 base salary<\/strong>
$20,000 from speaking engagements<\/strong><\/p>\nI perform about ten surgeries per week. Every hospital is a little different, but at mine, what most people negotiate is some kind of estimate for how much work they think they\u2019re going to do and then they get that salary up front with the idea that they\u2019ll reach that goal. If you exceed it, you can get bonuses. It\u2019s an estimate that\u2019s mostly based on pride; I had to kind of just look at my averages over the years and try to extrapolate. I feel fairly compensated, but for the past 30 years, insurance companies have kept chipping away at the amount that they\u2019ll reimburse. Not only has that not kept up with inflation for 30 years but it\u2019s actually gone down. The hospital is really like any kind of business where there\u2019s the pressure to do more, do more, do more, but they don\u2019t always appreciate what your value is.<\/p>\n
$75,000 base salary<\/strong>
$50,000 from federal contracts<\/strong>
$20,000 from city contracts<\/strong><\/p>\nI work a few gigs. I have a salary from Urban Pest Management \u2014 we work mostly with high-rise residential buildings and townhouses. We also have city contracts where we do rat remediation and gas them in tree pits on the street; I get paid extra for that. Plus federal contracts for buildings across the boroughs. That gig is easier because the buildings are already well maintained. I work Mondays through Fridays, 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sometimes I pick up Saturdays. There was a lot of work during COVID when there was way more trash than what the Sanitation Department was used to. Now it\u2019s come back down a little, but I think this year it\u2019s going to ramp up again. It was a very wet winter, which helps things like ants and termites breed.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve been a DJ for 20 years, but most of my career was in Europe and Russia. I moved here a few years ago. I make more money, but I spend so much more also. After expenses, I made about $135,000. It\u2019s travel, it\u2019s costumes, it\u2019s makeup \u2014 I have a look. What I make depends on the club, whether it\u2019s a private or public event, how long they need me for. I play fancy upscale clubs popular with wealthy New Yorkers. I have no experience in Brooklyn, so I can\u2019t compare fees. My minimum is $500 per gig \u2014 that\u2019s for three or four hours of work \u2014 and it could be up to $3,500. I\u2019m working every Thursday, Friday, Saturday, sometimes Sundays, sometimes Wednesdays. During Christmastime and Fashion Week, it\u2019s busy; I\u2019m working from Tuesday to Sunday. On a regular week, I spend about 15 hours onstage, maybe 18. Busier times, it can easily be 25 hours.<\/p>\n
$68,000 base salary<\/strong>
$15,000 in overtime<\/strong><\/p>\nI receive top pay because I have almost ten years\u2019 experience. We also get overtime a number of ways \u2014 if a new person comes in, you get overtime to train them. Any time you work on your day off, you get paid time and a half. And then let\u2019s say they have to do some work on the tracks and that causes you to stay late \u2014 that\u2019s called a late clear, which means I get a bonus that is equal to half the amount of extra hours I worked. If you work a holiday, you get paid double. Your birthday is technically a holiday. If you work on your birthday and it\u2019s a holiday, you get triple pay. That\u2019s where the real money is. But I don\u2019t care; I never work on my birthday.<\/p>\n
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