Self-employment method
Commercial and Industrial Machinery and Equipment (except Automotive and Electronic) Repair and Maintenance
37,297 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 37,297 people who filed under this code in 2022, 27.07% 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 = 37,297 · 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 | 5,807 | 15.6% |
| $5,000 to $9,999 | 4,291 | 11.5% |
| $10,000 to $24,999 | 7,238 | 19.4% |
| $25,000 to $49,999 | 5,887 | 15.8% |
| $50,000 to $99,999 | 5,675 | 15.2% |
| $100,000 to $249,999 | 5,571 | 14.9% |
| $250,000 to $499,999 | 1,949 | 5.2% |
| $500,000 to $999,999 | 698 | 1.9% |
| $1,000,000 to $2,499,999 | 181 | 0.5% |
Who this suits
At a $30,574 median in gross receipts, the typical person under this code is running a real but part-time operation. Full-time equivalence would require roughly triple this before costs.
37,297 people filed under this code, almost none of whom appear in any employment statistic. Commercial and Industrial Machinery and Equipment (except Automotive and Electronic) Repair and Maintenance is part of the economy salary surveys simply do not see.
22.5% of filers grossed $100,000 or more. At that share the upper band is not an exception, it is a large minority of the field — though gross receipts at this level usually carry proportionate costs.
Independent repair and maintenance is the classic van, tools and phone number business, and suits people who can build a book of local customers by referral.
Nothing stops anyone filing under this code, and 37,297 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 Commercial and Industrial Machinery and Equipment (except Automotive and Electronic) Repair and Maintenance earns 10.1x the bottom quarter — under $9,098 against over $91,848, a spread of $82,750. Distributions this stretched are usually two different jobs sharing one label, and any average across them means little.
The bottom quarter of Commercial and Industrial Machinery and Equipment (except Automotive and Electronic) Repair and Maintenance earns under $9,098 — $40,922 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 without a customer base already forming; the van payment starts immediately and the referrals do not.
10,096 of the 37,297 people filing in 2022 grossed under $10,000 across twelve months — 27.1% of the field. A quarter or more of everyone in Commercial and Industrial Machinery and Equipment (except Automotive and Electronic) Repair and Maintenance took in less revenue than a part-time job would have paid in wages.
That share is a floor, not an estimate: $10,000 is revenue, not earnings. Everyone counted inside it kept less than $10,000, and an unknown number of the filers above it also finished the year with nothing after costs.
What the spread tells you
At 10.1x, the gap between $9,098 and $91,848 is the shape of a field with a small, well-paid top. $30,574 is real and it is not a forecast — the people quoting the upper end at you are describing a minority.
The middle half of this field earns between $9,098 and $91,848. That is $82,750 of range, with $30,574 sitting inside it as the point half the field is above and half below.
The 75th percentile is $91,848. Reaching it from the $30,574 midpoint is $61,274 a year; reaching it from the $9,098 that the bottom quarter of Commercial and Industrial Machinery and Equipment (except Automotive and Electronic) Repair and Maintenance earn is $82,750.
The top quarter of Commercial and Industrial Machinery and Equipment (except Automotive and Electronic) Repair and Maintenance begins $61,274 above the $30,574 midpoint, while the bottom quarter starts only $21,476 below it. A range stretched that far in one direction is the signature of a field where a small group earns a great deal more than the middle does.
Per hour of a full-time year, the middle of Commercial and Industrial Machinery and Equipment (except Automotive and Electronic) Repair and Maintenance takes $14.69 in revenue — $4.37 at the bottom quarter and $44.15 at the top. Costs have not been deducted from any of those figures, so none of them is an hourly wage.
The raw counts, before anyone interprets them: under $5,000, 5,807 filers. $5,000 to $9,999, 4,291. $10,000 to $24,999, 7,238. Over $100,000, 8,399 — and 2,828 over $250,000.
What these figures are, and what they are not
Every figure above is GROSS RECEIPTS, before expenses — money that arrived before rent, materials, fuel, insurance and self-employment tax. The $30,574 midpoint for Commercial and Industrial Machinery and Equipment (except Automotive and Electronic) Repair and Maintenance is not take-home pay and is not comparable to a $30,574 salary.
Treat the per-hour figure as a conversion. It assumes a flat full-time year against $30,574 because we have no verified record of unpaid hours or out-of-pocket costs for this work, and we would rather convert honestly than adjust invented ones.
How this is calculated · Self-employment failure rates · What credentials cost and pay back · Look up something else