Self-employment method
Document Preparation Services
97,350 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 97,350 people who filed under this code in 2022, 51.24% 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 = 97,350 · 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 | 29,722 | 30.5% |
| $5,000 to $9,999 | 20,164 | 20.7% |
| $10,000 to $24,999 | 31,092 | 31.9% |
| $25,000 to $49,999 | 10,476 | 10.8% |
| $50,000 to $99,999 | 3,929 | 4.0% |
| $100,000 to $249,999 | 1,525 | 1.6% |
| $250,000 to $499,999 | 327 | 0.3% |
| $500,000 to $999,999 | 93 | 0.1% |
| $1,000,000 to $2,499,999 | 22 | 0.0% |
Who this suits
Median gross receipts of $9,700 put the typical Document Preparation Services filer well below any full-time threshold. Revenue at that level covers a hobby’s costs and rarely much beyond them.
97,350 people filed under this code. A field that large has a settled price, a settled set of expectations, and no shortage of people willing to meet both.
The share clearing $100,000 in receipts is 2.0%. That is roughly one filer in forty, which is the honest denominator behind any story you have read about doing Document Preparation Services full time.
Independent support services suit people who can sell a contract rather than a job, and who are organised enough to deliver one consistently.
There is no training requirement to file under this code — which is precisely why so many people appear in the bottom bands. Entry being free is not the same as the work being viable.
Who should not do this
Bottom quarter under $4,094, top quarter over $21,157: 5.2x, or $1,421 a month. At this stretch the label has stopped describing one occupation, and every summary statistic about it — including the midpoint — should be treated with suspicion.
The bottom quarter of Document Preparation Services earns under $4,094 — $45,926 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 costing your travel time. Between-job time is unpaid and it is what quietly destroys the hourly rate.
The majority of this field — 51.2%, or 49,882 of 97,350 filers in 2022 — grossed under $10,000 for the year. When more than half the population is in the bottom band, that band is the normal outcome of Document Preparation Services, not the failure case.
Take it as a floor, not an estimate. The $10,000 threshold is measured on money received, before materials, rent, fuel, insurance and self-employment tax, so the true share of filers who ended the year with no income is higher than the figure shown — we simply cannot say how much higher.
What the spread tells you
At 5.2x, the gap between $4,094 and $21,157 is the shape of a field with a small, well-paid top. $9,700 is real and it is not a forecast — the people quoting the upper end at you are describing a minority.
Put in money rather than ratios: $4,094 at the 25th percentile, $9,700 at the midpoint, $21,157 at the 75th. $17,063 separates the quarter of Document Preparation Services at the bottom from the quarter at the top.
Between $4,094 and $21,157 — the two ends of the middle half — sits $9,700. Moving from the midpoint to the upper quarter is worth $11,457; the whole climb from the lower quarter is $17,063.
The upper half of the middle range — $9,700 to $21,157, or $11,457 — is far longer than the lower half at $5,606. In a shape like this an average would flatter Document Preparation Services considerably, and would describe nobody.
Converted to a 2,080-hour year, the receipts run $1.96 an hour at the 25th percentile, $4.66 at the midpoint and $10.17 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 Document Preparation Services: 29,722 filers under $5,000, 20,164 between $5,000 and $9,999, 31,092 between $10,000 and $24,999, 1,967 above $100,000 and 442 above $250,000.
What these figures are, and what they are not
These are GROSS RECEIPTS: everything that came in, before expenses. Rent, stock, fuel, insurance and self-employment tax all come out of the $9,700 midpoint before anyone eats, so it is not comparable with a $9,700 wage and should never be read as one.
The hourly number on this page is $9,700 divided by a 2,080-hour year and nothing more. We hold no unpaid-hours or cost data for Document Preparation Services, so it is arithmetic rather than an effective rate.
How this is calculated · Self-employment failure rates · What credentials cost and pay back · Look up something else