Self-employment method
Other support services
135,051 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 135,051 people who filed under this code in 2022, 49.51% 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 = 135,051 · 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 | 43,030 | 31.9% |
| $5,000 to $9,999 | 23,839 | 17.7% |
| $10,000 to $24,999 | 30,528 | 22.6% |
| $25,000 to $49,999 | 16,212 | 12.0% |
| $50,000 to $99,999 | 10,728 | 7.9% |
| $100,000 to $249,999 | 7,148 | 5.3% |
| $250,000 to $499,999 | 2,386 | 1.8% |
| $500,000 to $999,999 | 895 | 0.7% |
| $1,000,000 to $2,499,999 | 285 | 0.2% |
Who this suits
Median gross receipts of $10,323 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 135,051 filers, Other support services is a substantial informal workforce. Enough people do it that local pricing is set by the field rather than by you.
10,669 people — 7.9% of filers — grossed $100,000 or more. At that share the upper tier is visible from inside the field, which usually means someone doing Other support services locally can tell you what those people do differently.
This work suits people who can build a route or a roster of regular clients, because the second visit is where the margin in this subsector actually lives.
There is no qualification, licence or minimum to appear in this data — you file and you are counted. Read the receipts distribution as the price of that: no barrier at the door means no filter before the numbers.
Who should not do this
The top quarter of Other support services earns 7.9x the bottom quarter — under $3,923 against over $31,001, a spread of $27,078. Distributions this stretched are usually two different jobs sharing one label, and any average across them means little.
The bottom quarter of Other support services earns under $3,923 — $46,097 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 dependent on a single large client; contract services concentrate fast and the loss of one ends the year.
Of the 135,051 people who filed as Other support services in 2022, 49.5% grossed under $10,000 for the year — 66,863 people who did not clear a part-time wage in revenue, let alone in profit.
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 7.9x between the quarters is the signature of a winner-take-most distribution. $10,323 is a real number about a real population, but nobody entering Other support services should plan around it.
The middle half of this field earns between $3,923 and $31,001. That is $27,078 of range, with $10,323 sitting inside it as the point half the field is above and half below.
The 75th percentile is $31,001. Reaching it from the $10,323 midpoint is $20,678 a year; reaching it from the $3,923 that the bottom quarter of Other support services earn is $27,078.
$6,400 below the midpoint, $20,678 above it. That asymmetry is extreme even for this data, and it means every summary of Other support services that is not a median — including any average you see quoted elsewhere — is describing the top of the range rather than the middle.
Spread across a 2,080-hour year those receipts come to $4.96 an hour at the midpoint, $1.88 at the 25th percentile and $14.90 at the 75th. That is turnover per hour, not pay per hour, and it is not comparable with the $24.04 an hour a typical American job pays.
Counted straight off the return: 43,030 filers grossed under $5,000, 23,839 took $5,000 to $9,999, 30,528 took $10,000 to $24,999, 10,714 cleared $100,000 and 3,566 cleared $250,000.
What these figures are, and what they are not
Read every figure here as GROSS RECEIPTS rather than income. $10,323 is turnover — the money that passed through Other support 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 Other support services, the hourly figure is $10,323 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