Introduction

Amy Schumer is an American professional stand-up comedian and actress with an estimated net worth of $45 Million.

In the late 2010s, Amy Schumer was raking in money from every single direction, holding at least half a dozen significant income streams. This included projects such as her Netflix special, film salaries, book advances, live show performances, and endorsement deals. As a result, her net worth exploded during this time. 

This profile details our research into the factors that have affected Amy Schumer’s wealth significantly throughout her career, covering her earnings history, income sources, assets, and highest-grossing films.

Quick Facts

• Earned a combined $65.5 million over three years (2016, 2017, 2019)
• Received an $8 million book advance in 2015
• Secured a $13 million deal with Netflix for The Leather Special
• Grossed almost $1 billion at the global box office
• Earns approximately $500,000 per live show

Earnings History

In 2016, Amy Schumer became the world’s first female comedian to be featured on the Forbes list, earning an estimated $17 million that year, and placing fourth. This meant that she’d earned more in a single year than other renowned comics such as Dave Chappelle, Jeff Dunham, and Jim Gaffigan. However, despite this, the bulk of her income wasn’t generated through comedy. Almost half of her earnings that year were thanks to an $8 million book advance from Simon & Schuster. The remainder came from a combination of her upfront salary for starring in Trainwreck and her earnings from the sketch comedy series Inside Amy Schumer, which aired on Comedy Central.

Schumer also made the list again in 2017, and despite appearing a spot lower at fifth, her annual income had exploded to an estimated $37.5 million. However, this time, instead of book advances being her primary income source, it was her deal with Netflix that stole the show. According to initial reports, she was expected to receive $11 million to produce the stand-up special, The Leather Special. However, after she heard that Chris Rock and Dave Chappelle were being paid $20 million each, she renegotiated and allegedly secured a higher value.

Finally, in 2019, she earned an estimated $21 million, which would bring her earnings from the three years combined to a total of $65.5 million.

The Leather Special

At the beginning of 2017, Amy Schumer signed a lucrative contract with the streaming platform Netflix for her comedy special, The Leather Special, which was filmed live in Denver. It was reported that Schumer would receive $11 million from the special, which at the time was the most any female comedian had received or been offered from such a deal.

Initially, Schumer seemed satisfied with the financial incentives. However, just a short while later, in March of that year, both Chris Rock and Dave Chappelle also signed Netflix contracts for their own comedy specials. According to reports, they were each going to receive $20 million, and after Amy learned of the news, she went back to the company to ask for more money.

The situation led to much controversy and dispute surrounding the topic of gender pay gaps in entertainment-based industries, but Schumer later clarified that she didn’t demand to be paid on equal terms. She simply used Rock and Chappelle’s contracts as leverage to squeeze more out of her own. Schumer allegedly managed to renegotiate with Netflix and secure an additional $2 million, bringing her total earnings from the special to $13 million.

Highest-Grossing Movies

Schumer is known for her raunchy comedies, such as Trainwreck and Snatched, but those films have recently been pushed down the list by her voiceover work in animation films, Trolls Band Together and IF. Trolls Band Together grossed $209 million worldwide, becoming Schumer’s highest-grossing film. The movie IF, in which she had a minor role, became the second highest-grossing movie at $187 million, despite being somewhat of a flop, with a production budget of $110 million.

2015’s Trainwreck grossed $141 million at the box office, costing $35 million to produce, making it the best return on investment in Schumer’s acting career. Other notable mentions that made the list include Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising, despite her only receiving a “special thanks,” which grossed $108 million. I Feel Pretty also grossed $95 million, and Snatched grossed $61 million.

Here’s a complete list of Amy Schumer’s ten highest-grossing movies:

1. Trolls Band Together – $209 Million (2023)
2. IF – $187 Million (2024)
3. Trainwreck – $141 Million (2015)
4. Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising – $108 Million (2016)
5. I Feel Pretty – $95 Million (2018)
6. Snatched – $61 Million (2017)
7. Bros – $15 Million (2022)
8. Seeking a Friend for the End of the World – $12 Million (2012)
9. Thank You for Your Service – $10 Million (2017)
10. Sleepwalk with Me – $2.3 Million (2012)

Real Estate

Manhatten apartment

In 2014, Schumer paid $1.695 million for an 850-square-foot, one-bedroom apartment in Manhattan. A year later, she relisted the unit on the market for $2.075 million. In 2016, the price was reduced by 20% to $1.625 million, finally closing a sale at the end of the year.

New York Penthouse

Around the same time, Schumer upgraded to a five-bedroom, 4,500-square-foot penthouse on the Upper West Side. The unit set her back $12.1 million at the time. She listed the property on the market in 2022 with an asking price of $15 million. It reportedly sold for $13 million.

Brooklyn Heights Townhome

Schumer and her husband, Chris Fischer, sold their penthouse in Manhattan to move to an area near their child’s school. According to reports, the couple was under contract to buy an $11 million townhouse in Brooklyn Heights. The listing has since been removed.

Introduction 

Larry Mullen Jr. is an Irish professional musician and actor with an estimated net worth of $300 Million. 

U2 Earnings History

Forbes has listed U2 numerous times as one of the world’s highest-paid music groups, giving a good indication of the band’s earnings during its peak. Considering that U2’s entries on the list date back to the early 1990s, it wasn’t easy to find every single time they’ve been ranked. The figures we found also leave a lot to the imagination, with some entries spaced several years apart. Nonetheless, here’s what we found during our research.

U2 first made the Forbes list in 1993, earning an estimated $47 million that year. This was largely thanks to the band’s Zoo TV Tour. The tour grossed at least $151 million in revenue across 157 shows, which equates to an average of $961,000 per show. Four years later, in 1997, they rejoined the list, earning approximately $30 million. 

The band’s financial peak, at least according to the data, came in the 2010s. In the first two years of the decade, U2 performed on their U2 360° Tour, grossing $736 million in revenue. At the time, it broke the record for the highest-grossing tour in music history, but it has since been broken by artists like Elton John with his Farewell Yellow Brick Road Tour. More recently, Taylor Swift shattered the record with her Eras Tour. For those two years, U2 earned an estimated $130 million and $195 million, respectively.

Recent Earnings

In recent years, the band has consistently produced annual earnings between $38 million and $78 million on nearly a dozen occasions. According to Forbes, their most recent $100 million calendar year was in 2018, grossing a combined $440 million from two tours: The Joshua Tree Anniversary Tour and the Experience + Innocence Tour.

Based on the information above, U2 has earned at least $742 million between 1997 and 2024. However, this only incorporates their most lucrative years, due to additional revenue from touring. They would have undoubtedly still earned millions in years when they weren’t on tour.

Promoter Lawsuit

As the drummer of U2, Mullen Jr. has been involved in a couple of high-profile lawsuits throughout his career involving the band. The first one came in early 1998, when U2 performed three concerts in Brazil, including two shows in São Paulo at Morumbi Stadium and one at Praça da Apoteose in Rio de Janeiro as part of their worldwide PopMart tour. Shortly after the final show, Bono and Mullen Jr. publicly claimed that the band had not been paid by the event’s promoter, Franco Bruni.

Bruni was one of Brazil’s most prominent promoters at the time, and he quickly denied all the allegations and confirmed that the fees had been paid. He was so unhappy with the comments that he filed a lawsuit against Bono and Mullen Jr. in Brazil’s civil courts, stating that the statements were false and had harmed his reputation within the entertainment industry.

Several years later, after the case had gone through the Brazilian legal system, on June 28, 2011, a São Paulo civil court found Mullen Jr. had defamed Bruni and ordered him to pay damages for reputational harm. Bruni was unhappy with this ruling and pushed for Bono also to be held accountable as a co-defendant.

The case reached its conclusion on October 4, 2016, when Brazil’s Fourth Civil Court of the City of São Paulo ruled in Bruni’s favor. Judge Renato Mandaliti determined that both Bono and Mullen Jr. were responsible for the misleading public accusations. He ordered them to pay a combined 6 million Brazilian real ($1.5 million at the time) in damages to Bruni for moral and commercial injury.

Paul Rose Lawsuit

A year after the ruling, in February 2017, British guitarist Paul Rose sued Mullen Jr. and the other three members of U2, Bono, The Edge, and Adam Clayton, along with their record label, Island Records, in the Southern District of New York. Rose alleged that portions of U2’s 1991 song The Fly, from their album Achtung Baby, had been lifted directly from his 1989 instrumental track, Nae Slappin.

Rose claimed that the demo of his song Nae Slappin was submitted and circulated at Island Records in 1989, two years before Achtung Baby was released. According to Rose, The Fly copied signature elements from his song, particularly the distinctive 12-second guitar solo, as well as aspects of the percussion and bass line phrasing.

Rose sought a minimum of $5 million in damages for the alleged infringement and demanded a co-writer’s credit on The Fly. Rose started the legal action more than 25 years after The Fly was released, as he claimed he had only recently discovered someone at Island Records who could back up his claims.

However, on January 30, 2018, U.S. District Judge Denise Cote dismissed the case after the court examined snippets of the two songs for comparison. It was stated that while both guitar solos began similarly, that’s where it ended, and The Fly did not meet the threshold for copyright infringement. Although the case was thrown out of court, it highlighted the challenges of dealing with copyright issues when songs sound similar.

Highlights

Here are some of the best highlights of Larry Mullen Jr.’s career:

• With Or Without You (Song, 1987) 
• All I Want Is You (Song, 1988) 
• Achtung Baby (Album, 1991) 
• Beautiful Day (Song, 2000) 
• Songs of Experience (Album, 2017) 

Introduction

Joy Reid is an American television host and political commentator with an estimated net worth of $4 Million. 

Reid built the majority of her wealth through a thirteen-year-long career with MSNBC. She reached a peak annual salary of $3 million per year at the network, while hosting the ReidOut from 2020 to 2024. In addition to her MSNBC salary, Joy also earns royalties from her book deals and fees from numerous speaking engagements.

Quick Facts

• Earned a $3 million annual salary from MSNBC during her peak years
• Typically charges between $50,000 and $100,000 for public speaking engagements
• Paid $55,000 to speak at the University of Iowa in 2023
• Sold her Pembroke Pines, Florida home for $350,000 in 2013

Before Wealth & Fame

Growing up in Denver, Colorado, Joy Reid was raised by a single mother who died when she was just seventeen years old. From then on, Reid became independent, later attending Harvard University, where she majored in film. After graduating from college in 1991, Reid moved to New York City with just $500 to her name. 

MSNBC Salary

Although Joy Reid began working with MSNBC in 2011, her salary wasn’t known until she launched The ReidOut with the network in 2020. While hosting the show, Reid was reportedly paid $3 million/year. This lasted up until 2024, when MSNBC began making staff salary cuts. They allegedly offered Joy a 50% pay cut, at $1.5 million annually, but she was later let go from the network.

Assuming she earned $3 million per year from 2020 to 2024, Joy Reid would have earned a total of $12 million during that period. 

Additional Income Sources

Despite Reid’s salary for her final few years at MSNBC being the most publicized figure of her career, she’s also able to earn substantial sums of money off-air.

The first stream of which is through speaking engagements, both live and virtual. Her fee is not cheap either. According to the AAE website, Joy Reid typically charges between $50,000 and $100,000 per engagement, and we do have one example of her being paid within this range for a past event. In February 2023, Joy signed a contract with the University of Iowa, which encompassed four obligations on two separate days, paying her a total of $55,000. Her obligations under the deal included participating in a phone interview, delivering a live 45-minute presentation followed by a 15-minute Q&A, attending a reception for photo opportunities, and participating in a 30-minute interview for the students’ college radio station.

Reid’s second income stream outside of television is from book deals, having published three books thus far:

• Fracture (2015)
• The Man Who Sold America (2019)
• Medgar & Myrlie (2024)

The financial details for all three books have never been publicly disclosed, and so we’re unable to know the values of her book advances and potential royalty payments.

Real Estate

In May 2001, Joy Reid and her husband, Jason Reid, paid $210,000 for a 2,506-square-foot, four-bedroom, three-bathroom home in Pembroke Pines, Florida. The property was relisted on the market in August 2012 at $375,000, but the couple accepted an offer of $350,000 a year later.

Jewelry & Clothes 

Joy Reid loves jewelry, and she often switches up her pieces based on the pattern of her clothes. She is a big fan of wearing jewelry from Opal Stone. She owns a big collection of luxury brands in her wardrobe as well. 

Highlights 

Here are some of the best highlights of Joy Reid’s career: 

• Knight Center for Specialized Journalism (2003)
• Fracture: Barack Obama, the Clintons, and the Racial Divide (Autobiography, 2016) 
• NABJ Salute to Excellence Awards (2018) – Nominated
• The Man Who Sold America: Trump and the Unraveling of the American Story (Autobiography, 2019)