Self-employment method
Carpet and Upholstery Cleaning Services
31,555 people filed as a nonemployer business under this industry code in 2022 — no payroll, no employees, just them. These are gross receipts reported to the IRS, before any expense is taken out.
Median GROSS RECEIPTS for the year — money in, before rent, materials, fuel, insurance or tax. This is not take-home pay.
Share who grossed under $10,000 for the whole year — before expenses.
The middle half, in gross receipts. A quarter of filers took less than the lower figure.
Source: US Census Bureau, Nonemployer Statistics 2022 · view
How often it does not work out
Of the 31,555 people who filed under this code in 2022, 36.00% grossed under $10,000 for the entire year — before a single expense was deducted.
That is a floor, not an estimate. Census publishes GROSS RECEIPTS, not net income. Everyone inside that share earned less than the figure suggests once rent, materials, mileage, insurance and self-employment tax came out — and filers who grossed well above the threshold may still have netted nothing. The true share of people who earn nothing meaningful from this is higher than the number above, never lower.
Denominator: establishments_total = 31,555 · US Census Bureau, Nonemployer Statistics 2022 · view
Every filer, by what they grossed
The full distribution Census publishes. The median above is interpolated inside the band that holds the 50th percentile.
| Gross receipts for the year | Filers | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Under $5,000 | 6,347 | 20.1% |
| $5,000 to $9,999 | 5,013 | 15.9% |
| $10,000 to $24,999 | 9,290 | 29.4% |
| $25,000 to $49,999 | 5,011 | 15.9% |
| $50,000 to $99,999 | 3,319 | 10.5% |
| $100,000 to $249,999 | 2,089 | 6.6% |
| $250,000 to $499,999 | 389 | 1.2% |
| $500,000 to $999,999 | 77 | 0.2% |
| $1,000,000 to $2,499,999 | 20 | 0.1% |
Who this suits
At the midpoint this work grossed $17,133 for the year — $1,427 a month in revenue. That is a real second income and a long way short of a first one, and Census cannot tell you which of those the typical filer intended.
31,555 filings sit behind this code — a workforce the size of a mid-sized occupation that no payroll survey counts, because none of it runs through a payroll.
8.2% of filers grossed $100,000 or more. That is a substantial upper tier by the standards of this dataset — the difference between a full operation and an occasional one is visible in the distribution rather than only in the anecdotes.
Independent support services suit people who can sell a contract rather than a job, and who are organised enough to deliver one consistently.
Nothing stops anyone filing under this code, and 31,555 people did. Free entry is why the lower bands are as full as they are: the distribution below counts everyone who tried, not everyone who was ready.
Who should not do this
The top quarter of Carpet and Upholstery Cleaning Services earns 6.1x the bottom quarter — under $6,538 against over $40,048, a spread of $33,510. Distributions this stretched are usually two different jobs sharing one label, and any average across them means little.
The bottom quarter of Carpet and Upholstery Cleaning Services earns under $6,538 — $43,482 below the $50,020 a typical American job pays. Entering at the bottom and waiting is a live risk here, not a theoretical one, and some people never leave that quarter.
Do not start this on one-off jobs. Without recurring contracts the acquisition cost eats the margin every time.
36.0% of the 31,555 people who filed in 2022 grossed under $10,000 for the year — 11,359 people. Approaching half of everyone who tried Carpet and Upholstery Cleaning Services took in less revenue than a part-time wage, before costs.
Read that as a floor, not an estimate. Census publishes gross receipts, not net income, so everyone inside that share earned less than $10,000 suggests once costs came out — and filers who grossed well above $10,000 may still have netted nothing.
What the spread tells you
From $6,538 to $40,048 is 6.1x — the shape of a field where a minority captures most of the money. The midpoint of $17,133 is arithmetic, not a forecast, and treating it as one is the standard mistake here.
In cash terms the middle half of Carpet and Upholstery Cleaning Services runs $6,538 to $40,048 — $33,510 a year between the 25th and 75th percentiles, against a midpoint of $17,133.
The 75th percentile is $40,048. Reaching it from the $17,133 midpoint is $22,915 a year; reaching it from the $6,538 that the bottom quarter of Carpet and Upholstery Cleaning Services earn is $33,510.
From $17,133 the drop to $6,538 is $10,595 and the climb to $40,048 is $22,915. When the upper half of the range is that much longer, the average is pulled well above the median — which is exactly why this site publishes the median.
Converted to a 2,080-hour year, the receipts run $3.14 an hour at the 25th percentile, $8.23 at the midpoint and $19.25 at the 75th. Read them as revenue per hour worked; the equivalent wage is lower by whatever this work costs to do.
Straight from the Census bands for Carpet and Upholstery Cleaning Services: 6,347 filers under $5,000, 5,013 between $5,000 and $9,999, 9,290 between $10,000 and $24,999, 2,575 above $100,000 and 486 above $250,000.
What these figures are, and what they are not
Read every figure here as GROSS RECEIPTS rather than income. $17,133 is turnover — the money that passed through Carpet and Upholstery Cleaning Services before expenses. What is left after costs is a different and much smaller number that this dataset does not publish.
With no unpaid-hours or cost data for Carpet and Upholstery Cleaning Services, the hourly figure is $17,133 over a 2,080-hour year — a unit conversion, not an adjustment.
How this is calculated · Self-employment failure rates · What credentials cost and pay back · Look up something else