Self-employment method
Sporting Goods Retailers
22,428 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 22,428 people who filed under this code in 2022, 33.07% 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 = 22,428 · 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 | 4,557 | 20.4% |
| $5,000 to $9,999 | 2,860 | 12.8% |
| $10,000 to $24,999 | 3,833 | 17.1% |
| $25,000 to $49,999 | 2,900 | 13.0% |
| $50,000 to $99,999 | 2,751 | 12.3% |
| $100,000 to $249,999 | 2,980 | 13.3% |
| $250,000 to $499,999 | 1,464 | 6.5% |
| $500,000 to $999,999 | 720 | 3.2% |
| $1,000,000 to $2,499,999 | 302 | 1.4% |
Who this suits
The median filer grossed $24,740, or $2,061 a month before expenses. That is an operating business at part-time scale: enough revenue to be worth running properly, not enough to be the only thing in the household.
22,428 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.
24.4% 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 hobby, book, sporting and miscellaneous retail suits people selling into an enthusiasm they genuinely share, because knowledge is most of the differentiation left.
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
14.4x between the quarters — $6,809 against $97,714, or $7,575 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 Sporting Goods Retailers earns under $6,809 — $43,211 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 plan for online competition, because your customers are pricing against it whether you are or not.
Of 22,428 filers in 2022, 33.1% took under $10,000 across the whole year in gross receipts: 7,416 people. Whatever the working version of Sporting Goods Retailers looks like, a third or more never reach it.
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
A ratio of 14.4x between the quarters is the signature of a winner-take-most distribution. $24,740 is a real number about a real population, but nobody entering Sporting Goods Retailers should plan around it.
The middle half of this field earns between $6,809 and $97,714. That is $90,905 of range, with $24,740 sitting inside it as the point half the field is above and half below.
The 75th percentile is $97,714. Reaching it from the $24,740 midpoint is $72,974 a year; reaching it from the $6,809 that the bottom quarter of Sporting Goods Retailers earn is $90,905.
$17,931 below the midpoint, $72,974 above it. That asymmetry is extreme even for this data, and it means every summary of Sporting Goods Retailers that is not a median — including any average you see quoted elsewhere — is describing the top of the range rather than the middle.
Converted to a 2,080-hour year, the receipts run $3.27 an hour at the 25th percentile, $11.89 at the midpoint and $46.97 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 Sporting Goods Retailers: 4,557 filers under $5,000, 2,860 between $5,000 and $9,999, 3,833 between $10,000 and $24,999, 5,466 above $100,000 and 2,486 above $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 $24,740 midpoint for Sporting Goods Retailers is not take-home pay and is not comparable to a $24,740 salary.
With no unpaid-hours or cost data for Sporting Goods Retailers, the hourly figure is $24,740 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