Self-employment method
Vocational Rehabilitation Services
11,539 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 11,539 people who filed under this code in 2022, 37.44% 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 = 11,539 · 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 | 2,574 | 22.3% |
| $5,000 to $9,999 | 1,746 | 15.1% |
| $10,000 to $24,999 | 2,729 | 23.7% |
| $25,000 to $49,999 | 2,063 | 17.9% |
| $50,000 to $99,999 | 1,581 | 13.7% |
| $100,000 to $249,999 | 702 | 6.1% |
| $250,000 to $499,999 | 115 | 1.0% |
| $500,000 to $999,999 | 20 | 0.2% |
| $1,000,000 to $2,499,999 | 9 | 0.1% |
Who this suits
Median gross receipts of $17,967 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.
At 11,539 filers this is a real but thin national population. There is no established price for Vocational Rehabilitation Services at this scale, which cuts both ways: nothing anchors you low and nothing anchors you high.
7.3% cleared $100,000 in receipts. That is a meaningful upper tier and it is worth asking what separates them, because it is rarely effort alone.
Independent social assistance work suits people who can operate on public and grant funding, where the contract terms decide the business more than the demand does.
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
7.5x between the quarters — $5,890 against $44,453, or $3,213 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 Vocational Rehabilitation Services earns under $5,890 — $44,130 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 grant or contract cycle you have no influence over.
4,320 filers out of 11,539 — 37.4% — reported under $10,000 in gross receipts in 2022. At that share the bottom band is not a warning about beginners; it is a description of a large part of the field.
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 7.5x between the quarters is the signature of a winner-take-most distribution. $17,967 is a real number about a real population, but nobody entering Vocational Rehabilitation Services should plan around it.
Put in money rather than ratios: $5,890 at the 25th percentile, $17,967 at the midpoint, $44,453 at the 75th. $38,563 separates the quarter of Vocational Rehabilitation Services at the bottom from the quarter at the top.
The 75th percentile is $44,453. Reaching it from the $17,967 midpoint is $26,486 a year; reaching it from the $5,890 that the bottom quarter of Vocational Rehabilitation Services earn is $38,563.
The upper half of the middle range — $17,967 to $44,453, or $26,486 — is far longer than the lower half at $12,077. In a shape like this an average would flatter Vocational Rehabilitation Services considerably, and would describe nobody.
Spread across a 2,080-hour year those receipts come to $8.63 an hour at the midpoint, $2.83 at the 25th percentile and $21.37 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.
Straight from the Census bands for Vocational Rehabilitation Services: 2,574 filers under $5,000, 1,746 between $5,000 and $9,999, 2,729 between $10,000 and $24,999, 846 above $100,000 and 144 above $250,000.
What these figures are, and what they are not
Read every figure here as GROSS RECEIPTS rather than income. $17,967 is turnover — the money that passed through Vocational Rehabilitation Services before expenses. What is left after costs is a different and much smaller number that this dataset does not publish.
Treat the per-hour figure as a conversion. It assumes a flat full-time year against $17,967 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