Self-employment method
Jewelry Retailers
62,040 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 62,040 people who filed under this code in 2022, 48.19% 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 = 62,040 · 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 | 19,944 | 32.2% |
| $5,000 to $9,999 | 9,956 | 16.1% |
| $10,000 to $24,999 | 12,361 | 20.0% |
| $25,000 to $49,999 | 7,162 | 11.6% |
| $50,000 to $99,999 | 5,285 | 8.5% |
| $100,000 to $249,999 | 4,410 | 7.1% |
| $250,000 to $499,999 | 1,653 | 2.7% |
| $500,000 to $999,999 | 789 | 1.3% |
| $1,000,000 to $2,499,999 | 392 | 0.6% |
Who this suits
Median gross receipts of $11,306 put the typical filer somewhere between a serious side income and a failing attempt at a full-time one, and the receipts figure alone cannot tell you which.
With 62,040 filers, this is a populated field. The market sets the price rather than you, and the useful question is what would let you charge above it.
11.7% 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 clothing and accessory retail suits people with a buying instinct, since the season is bought months before anyone knows whether it was right.
Nothing stops anyone filing under this code, and 62,040 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
10.2x between the quarters — $3,883 against $39,671, or $2,982 a month. This is the shape of a field where a minority does very well and the summary statistics quietly borrow their success.
The bottom quarter of Jewelry Retailers earns under $3,883 — $46,137 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 markdown discipline. A season bought wrong is paid for at the end of it, in cash.
48.2% of 62,040 filers in 2022 took under $10,000 across the entire year: 29,897 people. Close to half of everyone in Jewelry Retailers is in that band, and gross receipts is the generous way of counting it.
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
A ratio of 10.2x between the quarters is the signature of a winner-take-most distribution. $11,306 is a real number about a real population, but nobody entering Jewelry Retailers should plan around it.
Put in money rather than ratios: $3,883 at the 25th percentile, $11,306 at the midpoint, $39,671 at the 75th. $35,788 separates the quarter of Jewelry Retailers at the bottom from the quarter at the top.
The 75th percentile is $39,671. Reaching it from the $11,306 midpoint is $28,365 a year; reaching it from the $3,883 that the bottom quarter of Jewelry Retailers earn is $35,788.
The top quarter of Jewelry Retailers begins $28,365 above the $11,306 midpoint, while the bottom quarter starts only $7,423 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.
Converted to a 2,080-hour year, the receipts run $1.86 an hour at the 25th percentile, $5.43 at the midpoint and $19.07 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 Jewelry Retailers: 19,944 filers under $5,000, 9,956 between $5,000 and $9,999, 12,361 between $10,000 and $24,999, 7,244 above $100,000 and 2,834 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 $11,306 midpoint before anyone eats, so it is not comparable with a $11,306 wage and should never be read as one.
The hourly number on this page is $11,306 divided by a 2,080-hour year and nothing more. We hold no unpaid-hours or cost data for Jewelry Retailers, 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